Monday, April 16, 2012

The Kick Off


Why? Need I say why there should be such a blog that needs to state the sorry state of affairs our so called 'bollywood' industry is bringing into this world. I mean, its like it wasn't enough that we as indians have gone through enough torture and turmoil throughout the ages, but now we actually had to go global withrelease of indian movies worldwide and hence, bring out the cheap plagiarised stunts of many but not all... i repeat.. NOT ALL... producers and directors in our country.
Starting with the basics, we have Hollywood, and let me quote what wikipedia has to say about this term:
"Hollywood is a district in Los AngelesCaliforniaUnited States situated west-northwest of downtown Los Angeles. Due to its fame and cultural identity as the historical center of movie studios and movie stars, the word Hollywood is often used as a metonym ofAmerican cinema. Today, much of the movie industry has dispersed into surrounding areas such as the Westside neighborhood, and the San Fernando and Santa Clarita Valleys, but significant auxiliary industries, such as editingeffectspropspost-production, and lighting companies remain in Hollywood, as does the backlot of Paramount Pictures."Now let's try the Indian counterpart... not because we couldn't come up with a better name... but you know... because we really needed the west to approve of our cinema... so let us come up with something that sounds similar... hmm... what could sound similar enough to turn some heads from the West??... Then I guess one smart alec might have come up with some intelligent idea like---
"Wait!... Now B is for Bharat...or Bombay!!... Let's try B-Hollywood or Bollywood!!... What do you think??"The others awed in awe.And thus was coined the term Bollywood. Hence, for all you people out there who don't belong within the boundaries of the country called India, as well as for all those who do and never knew squat about it, Bollywood unlike Hollywood is not a state or district or town where the production houses and studios of India's media industry are based. Nobody can 'go to Bollywood' to be a star in India. Even if someone did, poor guy would reach as far as Mumbai. That's cos if you try asking someone directions to Bollywood, the fingers point as far as Mumbai. Once you reach there... well, that's another story. I'll have to start another blog on "How Not To Get Lost In Mumbai For A Newbie"And one might think this would stop there. But quite a few smarter Indians lived among the smart ones... and they brought in their own versions namely:-Tollywood - Disputed between Cinema of West Bengal, Bengali language film industry based in Tollygunge, southern part of the city of Kolkata in the state of West Bengal, India and Cinema of Andhra Pradesh, the Telugu language film industry based in the state of Andhra Pradesh, India. (Does it matter who came up with the idea first?)Mollywood - Malayalam Film IndustryKollywood - Tamil Film IndustryOllywood(!!) - Oriya Film Industry (Now ain't that even smarter?)and then of course... Lollywood - Film Industry in LahorePollywood - Film Industry in PeshawarSollywood - South African Film IndustryNollywood - Nigerian Film IndustryNow that we know of these, I think its safe to suggest Collywood for the Canadians or Rollywood for Russia or Gollywood for the Germans. Come on, comrades... register it before it gets taken!Anyways... the idea of this blog hit me one boring day at the movies when I had gone with my folks for some good entertainment, and I realized I no longer could sit and enjoy a movie without the familiar feeling of knowing the script from somewhere or the story from somewhere or the background score and beats from somewhere or even the sets as they are from somewhere!!, and trust me, not meaning to brag, I usually would get the answer under 5 minutes. In fact, be a motion picture enthusiast or simply a movie buff, and it really would not take that long for it to sink in.

Hence, here it is. A hearty welcome!!



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