UNBOLLYVABLE:

Bollywood Dreams (Carl Bromley, November 14, 2002, In These Times)

Perhaps the only thing stranger than off-screen Bollywood is what's up there on the big screen. There is nothing on earth like it. How to describe this strange film universe? Here are the usual cliches and factoids relayed by hacks: More films produced a year than Hollywood. Boy meets girl, boy and girl fall in love, but parents, class, caste and community don't approve. Bumbling but loveable servants. Overbearing mothers getting sentimental over their favorite sons. Domineering daddies who tell their daughters, "You will not marry that man!" Gaudy song-and-dance sequences of tenuous relevance to the plot. Films that go on for more than three hours. Biceps, midriffs and wet saris galore, but no sex, no kissing and certainly no nudity.

Inevitably the word kitsch comes up. But Bollywood is finally going global, aided by the spread of the Indian diaspora, but also helped by a new Western interest. Baz Luhrmann has acknowledged that his Moulin Rouge is an homage to the Bollywood musical. Andrew Lloyd Webber has teamed with A.R. Rahman, the maestro of the Bollywood soundtrack, to pen Bombay Dreams, a theatrical salute to Bollywood. Last year's Lagaan was the first Bollywood movie to be nominated for an Oscar, while Devdas, the most expensive Indian film ever made, was the first to be selected to screen at Cannes.

Not everyone is happy with this development.

If you're headed to Blockbuster (or your local variant) to grab a couple movies for the weekend, here are a couple Bollywood flicks to try:
Posted by Orrin Judd at November 15, 2002 8:33 AM