Cinema as an art? It’s purely for entertainment. It’s for fun, to forget all the stress that we had the whole day and then chill. These are the very common answers that you would find to hear when you ask some one the very question which is asked in the title. It this very common understanding amongst the audience in India that provides a completely different work for creative directors, actors, cinematographers, and writers who to a larger extent try to do something very soulful, highly creative giving cinema the real meaning, that its an art.

The increase in the use of technology is making this whole process a bit easy, which carries its own advantages and disadvantages. Now film makers with low budgets can make excellent films, but at the same time the human factor of the work is missing. A film may be technologically superb, but it is soulless if there is no strong script, good acting and above all appropriate direction to the requirement of script.

Breathtaking locations may be a part of the script, but to base the success of the film with just that leaves a void in this art. For example a film like Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna would not have been so successful if the location of the film had been in India. Locations have a restricted role in film making, one of the bright examples of which is Neil & Nikki, a horribly made movie whose only fuel was its foreign locations.

Those who think that making films is as glamorous as saying Lights, Sound and Action, then let me tell you its one of the most difficult form of communication where a combined effort of some hundreds with a well conceived script, an understanding director, well written dialogs and excellent acting performance where actors live the character is required.

Films which win the Oscars have the level of dedication in the film making that can be easily understood after watching the film. Indian Cinema is also not lagging behind in its creative abilities, but it’s far less in number than that in American Film making. Directors from the late 1930’s like William Wyler, Cecil B De Miller to 1960’s like Alfred Hitchcock, Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese and to the recent ones like Gus Van Sant, Steven Spielberg, Tim Burton and other have been quenching this very thirst of artistic film making, not to forget that American Cinema earns millions of dollars each year through popular themes. But this phenomenon is slowly missing in India with very few films and film makers making movies that can be considered to be master pieces. Film makers like Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Shyam Benegal and Govind Nihlani have been continuing making cinema with least techie make up and a lot of good script and acting. Other film makers like Mani Ratnam, Ashutosh Gowairkar, and Ram Gopal Verma have been trying to put a mix bag where the film is creative and at the same times makes money so that they end up finding a financier for their next vernture.

Indian cinema at the same time is also finding young and aspiring writers, directors and actors who are trying to be largely creative, examples of which can be films like Khosla Ka Ghosla and No Smoking which were difficult to imagine  a few years back. Films in other Indian Languages are also been increasingly creative, one of the best example is a Telugu film titled “Anukokunda Oka Roju” ( Suddenly One Day ), in which there are literally no loop holes, the script is very good, excellent communication through dialogues, wonderful cinematography and overall superb action. But what turned all this in to mockery is a copy of this script and then a remake in Hindi titled “Sunday” which changed the original thriller script in to a mockery comedy. This immediately shows the depth of the lack of creativity largely and the ease with which scripts can be copied. Probably the film makers of Sunday though this process to be easier than it really is.

The increasing concern is also the music in most of the films, film makers are now concentrating in involving independent bands or singers with music directors and then make a single good song track which gives promotional mileage to the film. Lack of this is also letting cinema die, slowly. Most of us get in to the scene in a film due its gripping background score which lightens or intensifies a particular scene. But this is also slowly missing; an example is the background in “Halla Bol” which is really very bad.

 Cinema can be commercialized but not hampering the art in it.

 
Finally a salute to all the people who gave us master pieces, to all those who are doing so and a warm welcome to those who are going to do so. May this art live forever.