I guess I am ....:-) Are you suffering from Slumdog-Oscar overload? 22 Feb 2009, 0000 hrs IST, Vikram Doctor, ET Bureau
Print<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4167490.cms?prtpage=1> EMail <javascript:openWindowmail1('/mail/4167490.cms',410,500);> Discuss Share <javascript:void(0)> Save <javascript:showdivlayer(4167490,'topdiv');> Comment<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News-By-Industry/Media--Entertainment-/Entertainment/Are-you-suffering-from-Slumdog-Oscar-overload/articleshow/4167490.cms#write> Single page view<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4167490.cms?flstry=1> Text: MUMBAI: Are you suffering from Slumdog-Oscar overload? Don't bother to answer that as a quick look at most other papers would confirm [image: oscar1.jpg] <javascript:openslideshow('/slideshow/4167500.cms')><javascript:openslideshow('/slideshow/4167500.cms')> *In Pics:**Slumdog Millionaire*<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshowpics/4020965.cms> *Oscar nominations*<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News-By-Industry/Media--Entertainment-/Entertainment/Are-you-suffering-from-Slumdog-Oscar-overload/articleshow/articleshowpics/4025195.cms> *British Academy of Film Awards*<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News-By-Industry/Media--Entertainment-/Entertainment/Are-you-suffering-from-Slumdog-Oscar-overload/articleshow/articleshowpics/4096710.cms> that. That's why this might be time to think back to a simpler time and place when Oscar nominations for even genuinely Indian films<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News-By-Industry/Media--Entertainment-/Entertainment/Are-you-suffering-from-Slumdog-Oscar-overload/articleshow/4167490.cms#> got little notice. Like 1958, when the first-ever Indian nomination for Mehboob Khan's Mother India was barely reported in the media. The lack of interest is striking, not just in comparison with the current carpet bombing of Slumdog stories, but even the more restrained interest that other Indian nominees received.Gandhi<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News-By-Industry/Media--Entertainment-/Entertainment/Are-you-suffering-from-Slumdog-Oscar-overload/articleshow/4167490.cms#>, of course, in 1982, while also not an Indian film (though it did have the half Indian Ben Kingsley winning Best Actor, and fully Indian Bhanu Athaiya sharing the Costume Design Oscar), was guaranteed widespread interest. In 1982 Salaam Bombay's nomination for Best Foreign Film also got decent coverage, although with the now familiar cribs about presenting unflattering images of India. In 2002 Lagaan's nomination for the same award was also widely covered, though this time the bitching came from Bollywood<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News-By-Industry/Media--Entertainment-/Entertainment/Are-you-suffering-from-Slumdog-Oscar-overload/articleshow/4167490.cms#> about lead actor Aamir Khan's willingness to attend this award ceremony, which he wasn't likely to win, while he famously disdains Indian ones, where he usually wins. *Also Read** → *Punters betting big on Slumdog Millionaire<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4103392.cms> * → *Slumdog bags top award at Writers Guild of America<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4095117.cms> * → *List of 81st Academy Awards nominees in major categories<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4158374.cms> * → *Director Sanjay Gupta missed making 'Slumdog Millionaire' by 'hair's breadth' <http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4108942.cms> By contrast in 1958 Mother India's Oscar nomination hardly registered while its success at the Filmfare Awards was well reported (something Amitabh Bachchan, a lead backer of the importance of Indian awards would feel happy about). This was a sign of a cautious change taking place in the importance given to Bollywood in the Indian media. Immediately after Independence Bollywood's image had not been high, a consequence perhaps of the still strong influence of Mahatma Gandhi. He had never liked cinema, proudly writing in Young India as far back as 1926, that: "I have never once been to a cinema<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News-By-Industry/Media--Entertainment-/Entertainment/Are-you-suffering-from-Slumdog-Oscar-overload/articleshow/4167490.cms#> and refuse to be enthused about it." A few years later, in Rangoon, when a group of labourers tried to put on a play in his honour, he angrily denounced: "The cinema, the stage, the race-course, the drink-booth and the opium-den, all these enemies of society that have sprung up under the fostering influence of the present system." Gandhi did eventually see one film, Vjay Bhatt's mythological Ram Rajya, and seems to have been thoroughly unimpressed. In a letter he noted dryly, "Nobody has lost anything by not witnessing the show." Post Independence this disdainful attitude to films was continued by followers like B.V.Keskar, the Minister for Information and Broadcasting, who banned AIR from playing film music<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/News/News-By-Industry/Media--Entertainment-/Entertainment/Are-you-suffering-from-Slumdog-Oscar-overload/articleshow/4167490.cms#> . There can be little surprise that the media did not give much space to Bollywood. By 1958 though some of this attitude had changed and in Bombay the Times of India gave proper reviews for each week's releases, though there was little film industry coverage beyond that. Mother India is often described as one of the films that changed this, since Mehboob Khan took pains to position it as a nationalist film, roping in Jawaharlal Nehru's support with a special screening. It was a foregone conclusion then that the film would be India's Oscar nomination. -- -A http://viewsnmuse.blogspot.com
