The facile view that foreigners have of Indian Culture

[Ram]

...and LMFAO @ the "why should we pander to Western audiences" line of reasoning. I don't know why Hollywood came into this, but since it did i may as well bring this up: Follywood films do nothing but copy Hollywood's material. You want to know why ? Here's why; 1. Indian diectors can't produce any original material and 2. Indian audiences love to see Hollywood-like crap on their screens. They can't enough of it. Hell, even the Indians themselves acknowledge it. Don't believe me ?

So says someone who , by his own admission , hasnt even watched 10 Indian movies.. :hahaha:

[Predator_05]

So says someone who ' date=' by his own admission , hasnt even watched 10 Indian movies.. :hahaha:[/quote'] That's fine, you don't have to take my word for it. Seen one, seen them all is what i say. But what about the statements being made in that article i posted ? What do you have to say about them ? "America has great writers, we don't." Comments ? Is it SKC or are they on a dosage of truth serum ?

[Ram]

That's fine' date=' you don't have to take my word for it. Seen one, seen them all is what i say. But what about the statements being made in that article i posted ? What do you have to say about them ? "America has great writers, we don't." Comments ? Is it SKC or are they on a dosage of truth serum ?[/quote'] Now that you have actually quoted Mahesh Bhatt , I would like to ask you , how much do you really know about him ? What i took objection to is when you said " Indian directors CANT come up with original stories" which makes it sound as though EVERY Indian movie is a hollywood rip-off. That is definitely not the case. There are some brilliant directors like Mani Ratnam, Sanjay Leela Bansali , who still keep giving brilliant scripts. Truth accpeted , 95% of Indian movies are trash. I wouldnt be able to sit through most of them. But , DONT generalize !

[Aditi]

Why should Indian movies have to be made to cater to other nations' taste? Should leave well enough alone and improve the quality to suit the Indian audiences, which is whom the movies are made for in the first place.

[Guest dada_rocks]

Nagesh Kuknoor sud be added to the list he is nothng if not original

[Dhoni's English]

I am sure his comments were not meant for feni drinking Goa lovers!:D And my support to his post was because I was a little cheesed off.His first thread was about how we shouldn't use hindi words ...and now this....that's all...don't mind ...ok?

I'm sure they weren't after reading the whole of the thread. I was being a tad myopic when I posted the highlighted piece. Actually I support the view that posters should use hindi words, because surely it's all a learning curve, hence why I ask for the english translation. After all, some of the words/statements may come in handy on my travels. :D Thanks for the justificatory post.:thumbs_up:

[maggot_brain]

So says someone who ' date=' by his own admission , hasnt even watched 10 Indian movies.. :hahaha:[/quote'] How many times do you need to fire a gun into your face before you know you'll die? Anyway some of you are missing the point. The point is not to make movies for foreigners. The point is that foreigners associate Bollywood with Indian Culture and fail to see the very best India has to offer. Who invented the decimal number system for example? There would be no modern maths without it. Karl Marx once said religion is the 'opiate' of the masses. Well if that's the case then Bollywood is India's crack cocaine. Makes you feel good for a short while then it's back to the harsh reality of daily life. Bollywood is generally pure formulaic escapism with no social. critical or artistic merit. Any film that does dare to criticise or depict the reality of Indian life usually get's lambasted by 'liberals' for portraying India in a bad light and the VHP/RSS/BJP try to shut it down. Deepa Mehta had to film her last picture in Sri Lanka cos of these Hindutva nitwits.

[suma25]

bhatt sahab has lost it he himself makes films nowadays which are shitty and accuses industry of churning out trash. the guys used to make such decent films saaransh ,was one which brought him into limelight . but dunno what happened to him after that.. as for him saying there are lack of quality writers saurabh shukla anurag kashyap jaideep sahni rajkumar hirani that they are not encouraged is another matter altogether hollywood movies are equally trashy dunno why bollywood people always compare themselves to hollywood. case in point martin scorcese's shittiest movie ever and bad remake of equally good hongkong movie infernal affairs got the oscar for the best movie says a lot about the quality of movies for oscars this year ...

[maggot_brain]

I am sure his comments were not meant for feni drinking Goa lovers!:D And my support to his post was because I was a little cheesed off.His first thread was about how we shouldn't use hindi words ...and now this....that's all...don't mind ...ok?

It's not my intention to offend, just that we (including me) as Indians should sometimes not take a rose-tinted view of ourselves. The only way we can go forward is constructive criticism. Not all Bollywood films are bad. I've enjoyed a couple of Aamir Khan's recent-ish films like Lagaan and Mangal Pandey (not very historically accurate though). With regards to the Hindi in posts. please correct me if I'm wrong but didn't the Indian Government try to make Hindi the only language of Government a couple of years ago? Apparently there were massive protests by the Tamils and Bengalis. Hindi speakers need to realise that there are actually 22 officially recognised languages in India and probably thousands more that aren't

[beetle]

>>>>>It's not my intention to offend, just that we (including me) as Indians should sometimes not take a rose-tinted view of ourselves. The only way we can go forward is constructive criticism. Not all Bollywood films are bad. I've enjoyed a couple of Aamir Khan's recent-ish films like Lagaan and Mangal Pandey (not very historically accurate though). But these films are made because people want them ...don't you think so. A lot of the films are made for the masses keeping in mind what they want. Some experimental films are also made because these is an audience fo that. Films are made for the audience which in the case of most bollywood films is the Indian masses not NRIs. >>>>With regards to the Hindi in posts. please correct me if I'm wrong but didn't the Indian Government try to make Hindi the only language of Government a couple of years ago? Apparently there were massive protests by the Tamils and Bengalis. It was something that happened many years ago as a misguided attempt by some misguided politicians.... You cannot blame hindi speaking people for it. Use of hindi is encouraged in hindi speaking areas and some central govt offices just as use of Tamil is encouraged in Tamil Nadu ...and other languages in different states.... >>> Hindi speakers need to realise that there are actually 22 officially recognised languages in India and probably thousands more that aren't What makes you think hindi speakers don't recognise that...? If you stay put long enough here you will realise that there are other regional languages like kannada ,gujrati ,punjabi and Bihari:P spoken here often without any objection from others.... When a person is writing in kannada ...then it is obvious to me that it is for the kannada speaking readers and that is fine with me and other non kannada speaking readers... You will find a lot of hindi being used because a lot more readers understand hindi....... We all need to overcome the stereotypes that we have grown up with including the ones about hindi speaking people.....

[maggot_brain]

What makes you think hindi speakers don't recognise that...? If you stay put long enough here you will realise that there are other regional languages like kannada ,gujrati ,punjabi and Bihari:P spoken here often without any objection from others.... When a person is writing in kannada ...then it is obvious to me that it is for the kannada speaking readers and that is fine with me and other non kannada speaking readers... You will find a lot of hindi being used because a lot more readers understand hindi....... We all need to overcome the stereotypes that we have grown up with including the ones about hindi speaking people.....

OK fair enough. Any time you write a language other than English you exclude some people from the conversation, that's all.

[Guest dada_rocks]

How many times do you need to fire a gun into your face before you know you'll die? Anyway some of you are missing the point. The point is not to make movies for foreigners. The point is that foreigners associate Bollywood with Indian Culture and fail to see the very best India has to offer. Who invented the decimal number system for example? There would be no modern maths without it. Karl Marx once said religion is the 'opiate' of the masses. Well if that's the case then Bollywood is India's crack cocaine. Makes you feel good for a short while then it's back to the harsh reality of daily life. Bollywood is generally pure formulaic escapism with no social. critical or artistic merit. Any film that does dare to criticise or depict the reality of Indian life usually get's lambasted by 'liberals' for portraying India in a bad light and the VHP/RSS/BJP try to shut it down. Deepa Mehta had to film her last picture in Sri Lanka cos of these Hindutva nitwits.

Trying to put forward similes as some sort of rational is outright stupid in my view.. Sample this just because some homosapien failed you, you don't take all of them as crook.... You see similes come in myriad hues.:D

[beetle]

OK fair enough. Any time you write a language other than English you exclude some people from the conversation, that's all.

yeah..I guess you are right to some extent. Anyways...I apologise if I seemed rude.