Click to play videoMumbai: It's a new Bollywood out there, with new directors experimenting with new themes and new story-lines.
Also in the mood to experiment these days are Bollywood's veteran filmmakers who are adapting to the winds of change, abandoning their sure-shot formulae and venturing into new genres.
Subhash Ghai's recent film Black and White has drawn mixed reviews and fared poorly at the box office.
Ghai – also called ‘The Showman’ – was, till now, known for making big budget, multi-star entertainers. From Karma and Ram-Lakhan to Saudagar and Trimurti, it was all about scale and style.
Black & White sees a new Ghai for it has a small budget, is issue-based and has an unknown new face in the lead.
"Black and White is a small film, a short film and a simple film, which I always wanted to make against the style of Subhash Ghai. It’s a film where I wanted to say something, there is a thought behind it,” Ghai said.
Subhash Ghai is not alone for other veteran directors like Shyam Benegal, Govind Nihalani and Jahnu Barua – considered art-house filmmakers – are also making an attempt to break away from the way they used to make movies.
While Benegal is now experimenting with a comedy Mahadev ka Sajjanpur starring Shreyas Talpade and Amrita Rao, Nihalani is making an animation film titled Kamlu and Barua is busy with an urban love story titled Har Pal, starring Preity Zinta and Shiney Ahuja.
"As a filmmaker, why should you expect me to make one kind of film all my life?” asked Govind Nihalani. “I will challenge myself, I will make musicals, I will make thrillers, I will make a comedy," he said.
"In the world of entertainment, it is the younger generation that determines the change, don’t forget!" pointed out Shyam Benegal.
The new breed of filmmakers are not just pushing the veterans to experiment, they are competing with them, too.
While Anurag Kashyap is busy with his contemporary take on Devdas, Sudhir Mishra is planning his version, titled Aur Devdas that’s set against the backdrop of Uttar Pradesh politics.
"I think today everybody has to challenge himself. You have to adapt, enable to understand in order to react to it via cinema. So if you don’t stretch yourself, you won’t last. So it’s a matter of survival for most people,” explained filmmaker Sudhir Mishra.
In this fight for survival, may better cinema prevail.
With inputs from Mihir Trivedi
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