The Allure of Tollywood

So, because of my negligence, I feel the nostalgic call to backtrack a little.

Before coming to India, I designed kind of a crash-course in everything I could think of India. I went to almost every library branch in Jefferson County getting books on Devanagari script, Hinduism, and most importantly Hindi movies. The JCLC has a surprisingly large collection, though I am afraid I forgot to return the few I borrowed…

The first movie I watched was “Sawaariya”. It’s a joint production between Bollywood and Sony and was supposed to launch a new era of Bollywood-Hollywood. That idea flopped… but the movie is great in terms of color and the ever-present dance scene. Also, it is ‘loosely’ (emphasis should be made) based on Dostoevsky’s White Nights, so as a Russian literature nerd I had to check it out.

Of course, since it was my first movie, I had no way to gauge or analyze the merits of a Bollywood movie. I have since learned what most movie are judged on:

1. how cute the hero / how beautiful the heroine
2. male dance numbers
3. and most important the heroines fashion sense

During down time and tent-lounging around time in the Himalayas, most of the girls’ conversations revolved around movies and the stars in them. Over and over again was mentioned “how X dressed in such movie”. It’s not that acting and talent don’t matter, but in a three-hour movie in which 1/3 is singing and dancing, bad acting is not as noticeable.

But watching a Bollywood movie at a couch in Birmingham does not compare to going to the screening of a Tollywood movie (Telugu-language) movie in Hyderabad.

Last weekend, I was invited to go see the new Telugu movie “Magadheera”. I have heard about this movie for weeks. It is so big that it is being shown illegally in the southern Karnataka, where there is a rule about how much time has to elapse before a movie from another state can be screened.

I went with my friend Soujanya, her mother, cousin and aunt, all of whom had seen the movie one time before. “It’s that good”…they told me. Movies show one toe two times a day – first showing and second showing. This movie had been showing for 6 weeks already, but still the theatre was sold out and the crowd out front, leaving the first showing, was impenetrable. Once inside we found our seats and Soujanya sat next to me to translate if I had any questions.

The movie started immediately, no previews, no warning for the all-encompassing massively loud surround sound. And the yells and the cheers started immediately too. I have a feeling this was the second time round for the whole audience, aside from myself,– they cheered before the hero appeared, they boo’d the coming villain.

The first dance sequence in the movie is here:



Though the movie was in Telugu, I didn’t really need subtitles. The story was basic: 400 years back a hero and a princess, very much in love, are tested by an evil villain. The princess dies and falls off a mountain, and the prince in a wild-eyed show of love jumps after here. Now, jump forward to 2009, Hyderabad. The hero and princess have been reborn, but their past lives stay with them. One day, the hero drives by a bus stand and accidentally touches the hand of a girl standing there. Suddenly he has a flashback of his past life. Now begins the quest in which he searches for the girl with the flashback-inducing hand, the princess. Of course, she leads him on, tricking him before ultimately falling in love with him. And then, obviously they must return to their past and change the ending to happily ever after.

Stretch that paragraph in three hours and you have a Telugu movie.
In the middle, during the intermission, every one goes to the lobby and gets corn with masala, tea and chips. The intermission came right when the characters were about to journey back into their past, and while drinking tea, Soujanya assured me that the next half was the best…

After the movie, every one asked me what I thought… did I like it? did I understand what was going on? Honestly, it’s hard to say what I thought. How do you rate a movie that is based on songs and dances in which the characters travel to ‘foreign countries’ (very well-made sets at Ramoji Film Studio) and sing about finding their one true love? In which the plot moves and jumps in time with little explanation and no demand for one? I refuse to judge a Telugu movie based on some A.O. Scott critic of plot and how the characters mirror the less palatable parts of the world around us. That is not the point. The point of Magadheera, and most blockbuster Indian movies as far as I can see, is entertainment, escapism. The US makes movies like this too – Spiderman, Batman - we just have yet to master the art of the 15 minute dance scene, and we are more concerned with heroes and villains than we are with reincarnation and love….

According to Soujanya and her cousin the movie ranked high in terms of the heroine’s clothes, the dances and songs. However, they complained, ‘the hero was nothing special to look at'. Allof this, I completely agreed with.... and, honestly, I think I am being won over by 'Tollywood'...

More movies and photos soon -

- A