Arrival of new directors, small budget movies and the multiplex phenomena.

The most hyped about multiplex phenomenon is here to stay and now along with economic importance it is showing certain amount of unification with society and culture as well. The place that earlier came up as the pilgrim’s ground for luxury shop-holics has now added a new dimension to entertainment for moviegoers. The contagious phenomenon of multiplex cinema halls has turned to benefit of one and all—viewers, new directors, small budget films, and experimental movies.

The hectic life of 9-9 economic scenario has given a lot to be demanded by the new young age working generation. The new pace is hard to cope up with and the multiplex culture offers a certain amount of relief to the overworked generation of present.
It provides them with relief from all that trouble that earlier went in catching a movie for mere relaxation. No more long crowded booking counters, no more disappointments of houseful, etc. with multiple movie going on in the same complex in different halls allow people to catch a movie anytime.

The multiplex concept has made it easier for small budgeted movies to make their presence felt among the audience. Movies like “Khosla ka Ghosla,” “Mixed Doubles” and “Bheja Fry,” etc. have been able to not only make a mark with the audience but at the box office as well.
The multiplex culture has ensured constant movement of audience towards such movies as well that earlier would had been left with no takers. This has also helped in the distribution of small budgeted films as the distributors and producers are no longer unsure of film reach, impact and box office collections. As a matter of fact in the past one or two years it has been observed that these small budgeted movies have done much better job with audience reactions in comparison to big-bucks Magnus-operas.
These movies too have done their share in making such impact on the audience. These films offer a pleasant escape to the audience which otherwise had been over fed with the doses of pulp-fictionalized reality of the tear jerking magnum operas.

The new category of movies presents humor, fiction, reality all at the same time yet distinction between each is never blurred which provides the well needed relief to the overworked generation of the age.

This multiplex phenomenon has also encouraged new directors and filmmakers to give reality to their visions. It has given them a sense of security in terms of audience and that it has left them with enough choice to experiment on their work. It has also made producers and distributors more confident in financing and distributing movies of new names and of new genres.
This has also helped the filmmakers to experiment on new genres and the multiplex culture has given a new way to art/ parallel cinema. Movies like “Maine Gandhi ko Nahi Maara”, “Khamosh Pani”, “Haazaron Khawaishein Aisi” and “Haazar Churasi Ki Maa,” etc. have caught audience fancy and thus made the experimental efforts of the directors successful.

Thus we see how the economic ground of multiplex provided opportunities for development and reflection on society and culture.

South Indian flavor missing from the Indian TV platter

Just as on urban Indian television rural India is very minimally represented similarly in Indian news, especially on national news channels, southern India is presented very marginally.
Music shows never concentrate on d south, Class 12 topper from north gets 9 o'clock headlines, but from south he/she gets a brief interview.
Several reasons go into this…and well I may or may not be correct in my observation.

Firstly, the language barrier keeps southern states separated from rest of the country. Since Hindi is the national language and most of the news channels have Hindi version they probably concentrate on the Hindi-speaking sector. Recently one of my friends pointed out to me that in d latest television show “antakshri”(star one) you can find four Zones representing India and those zones do not include south zone. It includes only north, east, west and Central.
While d shows tagline says “har akshar ki dhun par khelega India” yet somehow southern states are easily omitted, Which makes one wonder if South India belongs to India or not.

This is just one example. India’s 24-hour news channels have just barely an hour or two devoted to news related to the southern belt.

Well I also think that I will not be entirely incorrect if I say that ‘south’ in itself too is a quite secluded community, that like to keep within itself, maintaining their distinctive cultures and traditional roots.

Nevertheless, I think that we too have a hand in that sort of thinking being upheld until now. By ‘we’, I mean the rest of the country and representatives of people. Representatives of southern states themselves do not seem to b making any effort to work on solutions of language and regional barriers and towards bringing ‘south’ closer in the mainstream India.
You know one more interesting thing to ponder on is that in this modernized day n age of global village concept we have become much more closer to foreign countries like U.S.A. and China, etc, than we can ever be to our own southern states.

Well another reason is also d fact that d ‘heartbeat’ of India lies anywhere but in southern India. Like the politics of the country is concentrated in north especially in the national capital of d country Delhi.
Similarly, mumbai and Delhi together become hubs of India’s economy.
Even the hub of India’s biggest movie industry is in Mumbai whereas Delhi plays a very strategically thought of headquarters for all the major news channels of the country.

Bears and bulls, seats, ministries, bollywood, economics, politics, conservatism, ethnic differences, education, growth, and ideas of protecting a pure essence of cultural roots… well according to me all these factors go in seclusion of southern India from the rest of the country.