South Asian cinema

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South Asian cinema
Bengali cinema
Assamese cinema
Bengali cinema
Bollywood
Karnataka cinema
Kollywood
Malayalam cinema
Marathi cinema
Punjwood
Tollywood


South Asian cinema refers to the cinema of India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan and the Maldives. The region of South Asia bears close cultural and religious ties with the regions of East Asia and South East Asia. Bollywood, of India's has occasionally been named the largest film industry in the world, but the regional film industries of other countries in South Asian film industry are also as large as that of some European countries.

The terms Asian cinema, Eastern cinema and Oriental cinema in common usage often encompass South Asia as well as East Asia and South East Asia. See also Asian cinema, East Asian cinema and Southeast Asian cinema.

The far east as a cultural block includes East Asia, Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent.
The far east as a cultural block includes East Asia, Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent.

Contents

[edit] Styles and genres

The scope of South Asian cinema is huge and takes in a wide array of different film styles, linguistic regions and genres. South Asian cinema is particularly famous in the West for:

Popular South Asian cinema, as typified by the mainstream cinema of India, is usually centered around escapism, and thus often lacks more complex intellectual themes, political plots or tragic endings. This is gradually changing with economic development, as rural poor no longer make up the majority of the audience. South Asian art cinema in comparison has always contained highly acclaimed depth and style. Every film genre is present in South Asian cinema, although some, like science fiction and horror were up until recently, mainly intended for relatively small numbers of middle-class filmgoers, but are gaining popularity in the mainstream.

[edit] Regional industry

India contains many state languages which have film industries centered around them. Although Hindi is the official language of government business, its often-used dialect Hindustani is the most widespread language, and English is widely understood irrespective of region, the state languages are preserved for official use by different states in India, and many have as many speakers as an average European nation. Bengali cinema and Tamil cinema in particular are highly successful industries, Bengal having produced Satyajit Ray, Kerala having produced Santosh Sivan, Karnataka having produced Puttanna Kanagal and Tamil Nadu having produced Mani Ratnam, as well as many acclaimed films. Regional industries have also tended to produce a higher percentage of serious art film and political film. Bangladeshi cinema is filmed in Bengali and Sri Lankan cinema is filmed in Sinhala and Tamil. Last but not least is Indonesian cinema. In the beginning the Indonesian cinema grew after the World War I, rooted from the Folk Theater Drama called Dardanela. Under Usmar Ismail, Indonesian cinema became the new entertainment in 1950 to 1980. Hundred of film stars were born, such as: Citra Dewi (1960), Tanty Yosepha (1970). Yenny Rachman and Christine Hakim (1980) and Dian Sastro (late 1990's). Teguh Karya is one of the leading Film Director in Indonesia after the era of Usmar Ismail. Now, by the popularity of television, film is replaced with electronic cinema which is popular as sinetron. This industry has made the Indian born producer, Raam Punjabi, a tycon of sinetron in Indonesia.

[edit] Indian cinema


[edit] Bangladeshi cinema

[edit] Key figures of South Asian cinema

With the rise in popularity of South Asian cinema in the West, especially due to the twenty million Indian immigrants spread across the world, Western audiences are becoming more familiar with many of the industry's film-makers and stars. Some, like Satyajit Ray, who has been praised as the greatest director of all time by such luminaries as Akira Kurosawa, and who has often been cited as one of the three best directors of the 20th century, are legendary amongst film circles already. Some consider Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak and Mrinal Sen to be the foremost Indian directors.

[edit] Directors

[edit] Actors

[edit] Actresses

[edit] See also

[edit] Further reading

  • Contemporary Asian Cinema, Anne Tereska Ciecko, editor. Berg, 2006. ISBN 1 84520237 6
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