Messing up with massy?

Jasmine Singh

Veteran actor-director Amol Palekar in one of his interviews had mentioned about the struggling phase of parallel cinema, saying that this genre hasn’t found a place in India, and even the multiplexes have not been able to create space for it. And now, the very commercial Bollywood director, Farah Khan, has made a statement that commercial or ‘massy’ films are largely looked down upon at film festivals in India. Farah’s Om Shanti Om was showcased at the 37th Cairo International Film Festival only recently.

“When a foreign film festival honours you, I think, for us in a way, they get your movie. They get the business of your movie. But I think here (in India), the ones who organise festivals, they tend to look down upon commercial hit films or what they call the masses’ love,” this is what Farah has apparently said. Then where does this leave the arty or the films falling in the parallel cinema category? After all, the endeavour of the film festivals was to promote and showcase such films that don’t fall into the commercial bracket or the daily-increasing-crore club! Or, has the divide between the two become too glaring that we would soon need two different types of film festivals, one for art films and for the commercial crore club? Filmmakers and actors share their opinion…

Economic theory
Vivek Agnihotri, director of Buddha In A Traffic Jam

The first thing that we need to understand is that what are the film festivals for. Those were actually meant for films with a different kind of subject that did not get a commercial release. A Shah Rukh Khan film will get an opening, but what about films that people wouldn’t spend money to see. This is why we have film festivals, exactly like Literary festivals. Here too, people will buy Harold Robbins but who would buy a Jidhu Krishnamurthy?

And as far as international film festivals go, they are a big scam. Huge international film festivals showcase our commercial films because they want Bollywood stars and Indians staying there to come and watch it. There are many awards at film festivals that can be bought.

Why not?
Navtej Sandhu, director ofnooran

Why shouldn’t commercial films go to film festivals? See, the real market and revenue comes from the overseas market, and a film goes to a film festival, whether it is art or commercial, it will definitely attract corporate buyers that come from different parts of the country. If you look at director Anup Singh’s Qissa, one year before the India release, he rotated his film in the entire national and international film circuit. See the amazing response it got. I don’t think only art films should grace film festivals.

Not a regular fare
Madhureeta Anand, director of kajarya

Film festivals show films that are cutting edge. After all, festivals are like exhibitions where new innovation works are showcased, just like a trade fair where they wouldn’t show anything regular, but always something new. Commercial films are generally not included at film festivals because they don’t shake the boat, unlike the other films that break ground because of their story, direction or screenplay. But, I must add that commercial actors and directors are invited to film festivals because they add the glam quotient, at the same time, these directors and actors want to be associated with such festivals because they don’t want to be seen as just another commercial director. Now, international film festivals have trading centres, where the films are bought, and it is the commercial films that are bought hands on.

It’s possible
Rohit Jugraj, director of sardarji

Look at a man like Guru Dutt, who successfully removed the divide between commercial and art cinema, and here we are talking about commercial films not finding favour at film festivals. What needs to be understood is that a film is a film, and it should entertain. I can easily see A Wednesday, Dirty Picture and Masaan all being part of the same festivals.