For a UK professor of Film Studies who grew up watching Indian films, the recent Oscar success of Rahman and Pookutty is a welcome recognition of Bollywood films and themes.
For a UK professor of Film Studies who grew up watching Indian films, the recent Oscar success of composer AR Rahman and sound engineer Resul Pookutty is a welcome recognition of Bollywood films and themes.
Dina Iordanova, professor of Film Studies at the University of St Andrews, who researches Indian films and teaches Bollywood cinema in her department, said that teaching on Bollywood cinema had become a regular part of the curriculum in Film Studies departments in the UK.
"Indian films and themes have long triumphed around the world; memories of my film-loving childhood in the Soviet bloc would never be complete without references to Raj Kapoor's hugely popular Awaara," she said.
"A film which I believe to have been the biggest international box office hit in the history of cinema."
"Finally, a significant degree of recognition for this cinematic tradition enters the west as well. Composer AR Rahman who first enjoyed extensive coverage in the UK in the context of his score for the musical Bombay Dreams (2002), has now sealed his success with an Academy Award," she said.
According to Iordanova, Rahman's Oscar success and recent popularity of Indian films in the west was a continuation of earlier traditions that saw the Awaara (1951) emerging as the one of the "most successful films in the history of cinema at large".
Iordanova said Indian cinema was internationally popular for a significant period, starting in the 1930s and peaking around the 1960s.
There were massive exports of Indian films and massive international interest in it.
"However, as these exports and acclaim did not target (nor took place in) the West (until recently the only place where such processes are properly studied), we really have no record of the intensity of these cinematic exchanges other than sporadic references and anecdotal evidence," she added.
Recalling her Bulgarian origins and childhood, Iordanova said, "I knew Indian films long before I had met any living Indian. We knew next to nothing of India and the Indians; we did not know much of the personality of Raj Kapoor either."
The fascination with a film like Awaara (Brodyaga in Bulgarian) was everlasting; everybody knew the actor's ever-singing dancing persona. Nothing could match up to the experience of watching Awaara; this film was more fascinating than any other I can remember, she remarked.
"Even though repeat viewing is not typical for the cinema going practices of Bulgarians, many admit that they have seen Awaara numerous times. Why such fascination? The copy that we were watching was fairly old; the film was overlong and markedly over-the-top. Yet it was so absorbing."
Describing Awaara as film "that, in an unabashed manner, revealed a whole different world where preposterous melodrama came across as completely legitimate (and thus mesmerizing), where improbable misapprehensions triggered infinite suffering and obstinate injustices."
She was overwhelmed, as people were not ashamed to be overemotional and were solemnly preoccupied with enchanting adoration.
"It was the candid praise of love and affection in the Indian movies that was truly enchanting for us... Awaara remains a truly enduring global hit, yet one that is understudied and under-researched."
Iordanova said that it was difficult to think of any other film from the 1950s that was seen in so many countries and was as widely acclaimed as Awaara.
Most film history books, she added, analysed other films and mentioned 'Awaara' only in passing, "yet I cannot think of any other film from that period that would have enjoyed such popular success transnationally".
Iordanova said, "At this oldest university in Scotland (University of St Andrews), we are making sure Indian cinema is properly represented in our teaching and we regularly screen classical and new Indian films for our students."
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