100 years of Bollywood!

Time to check your facts!

66th Cannes Film Festival celebrated the 100 years of Indian Cinema this month. Indian cinema is always known for its escapist theme with vibrant colors and foot-tapping dances. The movie 'Indra Sabha' had 71 songs, the highest for any movie. Indian cinemas are usually 3 hours long with a break (interval) in the middle. 'LOC:Kargil' is the longest Bollywood movie lasting 4 hours and 25 minutes. In addition to UK and USA, the Indian cinemas are very popular in other Asian and African countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan, UAE and South Africa. Despite its popularity, Indian cinema has very little to show against Academic recognition awards like Cannes, BAFTA or Oscar. Indian cinema artists have secured only 4 Oscar awards over a period of 100 years.

Are you a movie buff? How well you do know about Bollywood cinema? Give a try!

'Raja Harishchandra', the first silent Indian movie released on 5 May 1913 by Dada Saheb Phalke
Image credit:dispatchesfromcoconutgrove.blogspot.com

Image credit: namastetimes.com	Which was the first talking movie released in Bollywood? a. Raja Harishchandra b. Alam Ara c. Kisan Kanya d. Neecha Nagar Answer: [b] Raja Harishchandra was the first 'silent' Bollywood movie released in 1913. Alam Ara was the first 'talking' Bollywood movie released in 1931. Kisan Kanya was the first 'color' Bollywood movie released in 1937. Neecha Nagar was the first movie to 'win' the Best Film award at the first Cannes film festival. There are unconfirmed reports that Bollywood made its first movie in 1899 even before the first Hollywood movie was released in 1907!
Image credit: namastetimes.com	When was the term 'Bollywood' coined? Why? Optional: What is the formal name for 'Bollywood' cinema? a. 1950, as they copied the term Hollywood to sound westernized. b. 1960, as they started colloborating with Hollywood technically and financially. c. 1970, when Indian cinema overtook Hollywood as the major film producer. d. 1980, when Hollywood needed a term to identify Indian cinema Answer: [c] The formal name for 'Bollywood' cinema is 'Indian cinema'. When Indian cinema overtook Hollywood as the largest film producer, the Indian cinema was termed as Bollywood cinemas. Even today, Bollywood is the largest producer of cinemas. It made 1000 movies last year while Hollywood made just 247 movies (wikipedia).
Image credit: namastetimes.com	India has 1.2 billion population. What percentage of this population are known to watch movies in theater? a. 25%, 300 million b. 20%, 240 million c. 10%, 120 million d. 4%, 45+ million Answer: [d] Yes, the industry wants 25% of the people to watch but according to BBC report only 4% watch the movies in theater.Even though India records the maximum number of ticket sales, around 2.7 billion, the average ticket prices are among the lowest in the world. Another interesting comparison is India has only 13,000 screens when compared to 40,000 screens in US. 25% of the Bollywood revenue comes from North America and around 5% of revenue comes music album.
Image credit: namastetimes.com	Even though Bollywood is the most popular Indian cinema outside the world, India also produces maximum number of high quality regional language movies in the world. How many regional Indian languages make movies for their own audiences? a. 18 b. 20 c. 22 d. 24 Answer: [b] India produces movies in at least 20 regional languages. Few notable ones are: Kollywood, makes movies in Tamil out of Chennai. Kollywood has the record of producing the most expensive Indian movie - 'Endhiran ($35 million)'. Tollywood, makes movie in Telugu out of Hyderabad/Chennai and it produces the highest number of regional movies. Mollywood, makes movie in Malayalam out of Kerala and it produced the first 3D movie in India - 'My dear kuttichathan'. Bengali movies are made out of Calcutta and are known for critically acclaimed movies.
Image credit:namastetimes.com	Indian cinemas are known for its spicy mixed masalas - a mixture of singing, dancing, romance, comedy and action. The origin of this song and story style is known to have taken its roots from Oprah. But why was the heros and heroins were dancing around trees whenever there is a duet song? a. Choreography was not that popular in olden days. b. Not enough budget was allocated for songs in olden days. c. Heros and Heroins did not know how to dance. d. Songs usually take more days to shoot, so want to cut short the time by filming it simple. Answer: [c] In olden days, the heroes and heroines were picked for their acting skills and not for their dance skills. Moreover, people did not expect heroes and heroines to dance - only performance. If needed, dances are usually filmed with skillful dancers.

Hope you had fun !