Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Who wants to be a Millionaire???

Freida Pinto, the Latika of Slumdog said in one of the ‘Making’ of the movie that Slumdog Millionaire showcases ‘True India’. That was the point where all the phoniness surrounded reached the bottom most point for me. That was the point where a respect for the movie changed to a dislike for the movie.

For me, the craze for the movie started when it reached amongst the Top 250 of IMDB List. In addition, I had read Q&A by Vikas Swarup around 3 - 4 years back and had loved it. So was really keen to watch the movie. The movie was interesting though different from the novel – specially the end where the motive of coming to the show is entirely different and captivating in the novel. But overall, I enjoyed the movie – better than the regular movies that Indian film industry was churning out. But only better – how was it different from a regular hindi movie – apart from the background plot of a KBC setting. And how did the entire Oscars thing set in??

On one hand was the news of 10 oscar nominations for this movie and on the other was the rejection of a much more thoughtful movie from India – Taare Zameen Par. The success of Slumdog at an international level seems to suggest that Hollywood is getting so-called ‘Bollywoodish’ whereas Indian audience are waking up and appreciating the ‘hatke’ movies – the tag which was reserved for Angrezi movies. Or is it the India – the emerging economy effect – just like it happened in 1994 – 95 when focus shifted to the grand Indian market and there was a surge in the Miss World and Miss Universe crowns coming India’s way. Indian film industry is in focus this time with the sector witnessing huge investments by the biggies like Reliance. With it becoming more business rather than a starry affair – an opportunity for businesses to invest and be ‘millionaires’. 

Though it makes good business sense but something that goes against us is the branding. Seth Godin defines Worldview as the rules, values, beliefs and biases that an individual brings to a situation and Frames as elements of story painted to leverage the world view a consumer already has. (Basically another way to define Segmentation)

From the recent developments a dangerous proposition that is developing is that this worldview of the rest of the world about India is in a pretty bad shape and people are putting up frames to showcase that pathetic worldview. 

1 comment:

Mahadevan said...

Fab thoughts.. The comparison with an array of Miss World and Universe titles in mid 90s is very apt.. Its speculated that it was done as a medium to launch high end beauty products in India.. As far as the oscars are concerned, we may see more nominations in future.. Since bollywood is slowly going hollywood and especially with a JV between RADAG and Spielberg, the Indian cinema is definitely in the talks now.. Just differ on one aspect on portraying of 'True India'.. I personally dont endorse the opinion that the movie makers have done a wrong thing.. Its creativity and they had their target markets very well defined ;) (just using my little Marketing gy..aan)