Recently Academy award was declared and was awaited impatiently by the world audience. This academy award was of more important to the Indian audience. Reason was Water, the only nomination from an Indian film maker. No matter the film was produced in Canada due to certain unprogressive reasons, but participation from the part of an Indian filmmaker suggests a completely different story. This nomination indicates towards the urge of progressive film making in India without any aesthetic dispute.
In recent few years participation by Indian films in academy award has increased. Film makers have started overcoming the cliché of “audience preference”. Can this be viewed as a progressive step by Indian film industry? Let us check every possible attitude of Indian film industry.
The charisma of Oscar has been affecting the world cinema, since long. Indian cinema can not remain untouched, in this respect. In fact with Mehoob Khan and Satyajit Ray, the ambitious journey towards Oscar began. Later it became a parameter of quality evaluation of film making.
The new millennium has come up with a new hope for the Indian cinema. Young and vibrant film makers like Asutosh Gowariker seem to be highly promising. With this generation of film makers, Indian film industry displays a new confidence in film trade. At the beginning of the millennium itself, Gowariker’s Lagaan, successfully landed to the Oscar. No matter, it did not succeed in convincing critics, but energized Indian film makers with confidence to build stories which are different from the Bollywood cliché.
Recent films display a fresh approach towards film making, in Indian context. These films including Lagaan and Rang de Basanti did not gather critical acclaim, but were worthy enough to e noticed. After all this generation of film makers are trying to come out of the passive phase of Indian cinema when atrocious creations were made in the name of “Audience ki Pasand.” At least these films have provoking elements which break the above cliché.
Of course Water remains outstanding in this chronology. Water was the real competitor in the previous academy awards, in its category. Had Water released from the country itself, pride of the Indian film industry could have surely gone high. This aspect of expression through a creative medium and its acceptance becomes another issue with a particular socio-cultural system. It was all due to the Hindu right wing aggression that this film failed to be completed on Indian soil, and the Indian selectors remained deprived of the opportunity of sending a film like Water to the Oscar.
Despite, all these examples are laden with good techniques and bold narratives. This is appositive development in the Indian film making. This is for the first time in the history of Indian film industry that three films were sent to the Oscar in one decade except Water, since it got entry from Canada.
At the end of the day “success counts the sweetest”. This proverb stands firmly with the success of these films. In fact the domestic audience has learnt to appreciate a well woven story. Altogether this could be interpreted as a positive development in Indian film making.
