Over the past decade, Bollywood has switched gears from urban romances such as: Jaane Tu… Ya Jaane Na (2008), wake up syd (2009), and blake kevard (2010) to romantic comedies set in small towns. Dam Raga Ke Haisha (2015), Valerie ki barfi (2017), and street (2018). The striking shifts reflect specific shifts in India’s cultural landscape, shaped by a myriad of socioeconomic factors that Bollywood is trying to catch up on.
“Most of the viewers don’t live in Mumbai or New Delhi, and they don’t go to clubs,” noted film critic Sucharita Tiagi told The Hindu. A small town as a backdrop makes it relatable to an audience that lives, or at least hails, from the hinterland. While small-town viewers may be able to relate to these stories, Subway viewers may find that they don’t pretend to be a much-needed respite from their fast-paced lives.
Furthermore, our cultural shift to seeing honest representations of human life on screen has also led to the deurbanization of Bollywood. We associate the suffocation of, when we see or read stories about people who do not have this suffocation about them, such suffocation disappears in their lives. It’s a big issue on the internet right now, and if you want to get people’s empathy, you have to put the most honest foot on it…” Tyagi says. This also ties into the kinds of stories that we’re interested in.”
According to Itisha Nagar, an assistant professor of psychology at the University of Delhi, in a sense, the change in narrative is also a transition from fantasy to reality. This change has actually been underway for decades. The late 1990s and her early 2000s saw the rise of films featuring NRIs. Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge (1995), Mold, comb, mold, gum (2001), Cal ho naa ho (2003), and salaam namaste (2005). In the mid-2000s and early 2010s, foreign locales gave way to the Indian metropolises.
And now, as part of yet another gradual transition, small towns have replaced cities as the most frequent backdrop.
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For middle-class Indians, Nagar explains, the “refined, educated, English-speaking” NRI becomes uninteresting beyond a point because it is irrelevant. Regional accents and dialects, on the other hand, are marketable fantasies that allow people to see themselves in the girl next door and relate to small-town character conflicts.
“Finally, Bollywood is turning away from its golden mirage to the real Indian true story…Thanks to the internet, it seems we really have the whole world at our fingertips. That’s why the film needs to take an immersive look from a foreign location to the unmapped terrain of the country.” Aara’s Anaalkali (2017) set in the small town of Ara. “Modern cinema can now claim to represent the truth of our cities and our lived experiences.”
Bollywood’s affinity for romantic comedies has also played a role in pushing filmmakers toward de-urbanization narratives. In small-town romance, love itself becomes an adventure, a daring act of defiance, setting the stage for silly overtures and comical scenes. gaffeThe local narrow alleyways present a largely unexplored visual, but the infamous bigotedness of its people can be traced from local shopkeepers and nosy aunts known for their enthusiastic contributions to the town’s vines. It often provokes a cheerful escape.
“Where is the love conflict in a big city like Mumbai? milan talkie (2019) is a romance set in the small town of Allahabad where Dullea herself was born and raised.
It’s also an influx of filmmakers like Dullea from the small towns that designed some of The Shift. Now you can find a producer for the story and prove that the story is credible. Tyagi says it is relatively It’s easier to approve your own screenplay now than it was decades ago when “only certain kinds of people with certain kinds of contacts and connections could be screenwriters.” .
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As journalist Lata Jha wrote for LiveMint, “[T]The trinity of Mumbai-raised film descents Aditya Chopra, Sooraj Barjatya and Karan Johar gradually compete with the likes of Hyderabad-born and Delhi-educated Kabir Khan, Imtiaz Ali of Jamshedpur, Anurag Kashyap and Abhinav Kashyap. I had to. Growing up in Uttar Pradesh. These filmmakers brought their own textures and stories to the filmmaking. “
As such, India’s diversity is truly reflected in its tales of small towns across the country, rather than the largely homogenous culture that pervades the subways that viewers eventually grow tired of. More real estate also means more uncharted territory for filmmakers to explore and for viewers to experience.
“Over the past two decades or so, what we consider small towns has changed more than most people in metropolitan areas realize. It’s a melting pot of dissent, aspirations, opposition, rebellion and compromise, making it a fascinating place for storytellers.” Aja Nakul (2007) and Sud Desi Romance (2013), both exploring small towns’ perspectives on love.
The transformation of small towns in India, Sahni describes, is the result of India’s economic restructuring over the last decade or so. “The growing economic stability of the country, the evolution from towns to cities, the proliferation of multiplexes, the proliferation of digital platforms and the resulting confidence show how open and ready Indians are. I have a lot more stories to tell about myself,” says Jha. “[T]The ability to tell and watch these new and unique stories also comes from India as a society. “
For Hindi-speaking viewers, the stories offer an opportunity to trample on their own languages, cultures and conflicts they might otherwise not have known. In some ways, it’s an excuse to truly appreciate the country’s diversity, through the personal stories of its people.
