Hollywood vrs Bollywood

 
The purists don’t like Bollywood being called Bollywood. And there are some big names out there, the machos who would won’t mind changing the geography of your face for calling Bollywood Bollywood. In any case, l decided to take the risk of using Bollywood for couple of reasons – it rhymes with Hollywood and the topic sounds natural... and hey, do you know the real name of Bollywood (don’t give me “Hindi movie industry” or “Mumbai movie industry”... they sound so uncool and unnatural...)

Anyway, the main topic of discussion is comparison of Hollywood and Bollywood (er!)...

“East is East; West is West and never the twain shall meet” – This is what Nobel laureate Joseph Rudyard Kipling said in his poem ‘The Ballad of East and West’... And this was “oh so true” for when you consider the movies – the storyline, cinematography, direction, acting, special effects... Hollywood was a winner hands down... our only forte was music – music being at the very core of Bollywood...

That was till recently... The more number of movies I watch and the more I think about it, the more they seem to be converging... in fact the lines are getting blurred more and more... there are a score of movies where if you mask the faces, cut out the sound (well, include subtitles) and, of course, take the songs out, you wont be able to figure out the origin of the movie... and I am not talking about the “scene-by-scene copy” kind of movies only...

The extend of convergence is amazing...

The special effects in Hollywood are getting better and so are they in Bollywood – the only constraint seems to be the money – while Bollywood producers are also splurging money on special effects, we still are a poor country...

Consider the movie Krrish... special effects are as good as it gets...

And consider Paa (while it’s not about special effects and is more about make-up)... except for the eyes and the unique shoulders and that too if you watch carefully, you cant figure out that Auro is played by Amitabh... not even the unmistakable voice of the great actor...

The Hollywood story lines are getting more Bollywoodish...

And I believe this is the biggest let down... gone are the days when Bond was a womanizer... he is a one woman man now and ready to die for his love of the life (what was the recent Bond movie?)...

Have you watched 2012? Great special effect but the story... the world is coming to an end but the “good black guy” (this is what I call reverse stereotyping) makes a passionate speech about the values Americans stand for and hence why it’s important to save a particular family at the risk of killing the last surviving set of people... how stupid and how Bollywoodish!

Watched Avatar yesterday... amazing special effects, out of the world... but again bulk of the storyline is around “haves vrs have nots” that was so typical of Bollywood some 20 years back... rich vrs poor and urban vrs rural... more or less... And the romance between the hero and heroin... they get cosy and express their love for each other, well, under a tree... I almost thought they would break into a song and dance around the pious tree but they settled for the old fashioned sex instead... thanks goodness for small mercies!

The only marked difference that remains is songs... Or is it? Do you consider Slumdog a Hollywood movie or a Bollywood movie? I have already heard rumours of Brangelina dancing around the trees on a song put together by Rehman!

I would honestly like Hollywood to go back to their old storylines as far as action and thrillers are considered... please keep the emotions out... keep the romance out... give me pure action and violence... give me my Rambo back... For the emotions and all, I still have my DDLJs and my KKKGs!