The Real Reason Why India Loves Bad Films

Skimming through popular news and avoiding rampant hateful opinions, I stumbled upon a trivial news about filmmaker Tigmanshu Dhulia. He found grand success of films like Total Dhamaal worrying. Tigmanshu Dhulia has directed films like Paan Singh Tomar and Sahib Bibi Aur Gangster. He played the famous Ramadhir Singh in Anurag Kashyap's crime opus Gangs of Wasseypur. It seemed unlikely an artist of that statute be jealous of a fellow filmmaker's talent. Yes, he could be jealous of a fellow filmmaker's bank balance, of course. So, I dug in.

You see, I need to give out a long introduction for Tigmanshu Dhulia. He is not famous enough. Though, this could be a reason for him to crib about Total Dhamaal, it surely was reason enough for the news portal to not give him even 200 words to explain his side. Nevertheless, it got me thinking. He says success of such films talk of poor state of the audiences. Poor state. Not poor taste. This instantly reminded me of my own desire to avoid war mongering news that got me to the entertainment section in the first place. I might be wrong now, but this realization when generalized explains a lot of things.

Success of poor films doesn't necessarily imply audiences' poor taste. Rather, a large section of society is so frustrated and under such great stress that any kind of escapism is welcome. This explains why we have a genre of mad comedies in India and why we objectify our women, our army, our poverty in films. Also why we refrain from any complex emotion and why our mainstream movies are simpler than kids' movies. And why critics writing reviews in air conditioned offices fail to see what masses find interesting in shit movies. But this difference does not mean lack of complexity in the struggling class nor does it imply elitism on reviewer's part. Art thrives in peace and comfort. But Indian audiences undergo constant stress. Well, a big chunk does. The forever long struggle to break away from the humiliation by the system and constricting culture has desensitized us towards art. There is no real leisure. We just wish to see good looking faces on bright lit sets in high contrast images. Anything that doesn't put stress on the mind and allows to forget the despicable real life for a few hours would do.

Bad films reflect society as much as any great film. This, as you may have guessed, is alarming. The stupider our movies are, more is the sorry state of our society. But the solution doesn't lie in banning the filmmakers from generating escapist expression. In fact, there is no single solution. Acknowledging the problem would be a good start, though. Every society comprises of culture, politics and economy all going in and coming out of each other, intertwined. So, to create good cinema, there is no other way other than making audience's lives better.