Bollywood

o Genre conventions o Bollywood song and dance o Dialogues and lyricso Cast and crewo Financeso List of popular Bollywood films

Bollywood

Bollywood is the informal name given to the popular Mumbai-based Hindi language film industry in India.The name is a conflation of Bombay, the old name of Mumbai, and Hollywood, the center of the United States film industry. Though some purists deplore the name (they say it makes the industry look like a poor cousin to Hollywood), it seems likely to persist and now has its own entry in the Oxford English Dictionary.Bollywood and the other major cinematic hubs (Tamil - Kollywood, Telugu - Tollywood, Bengali, Kannada, and Malayalam) constitute the broader Indian film industry, whose output is the largest in the world in terms of number of films produced and in number of tickets sold. Bollywood is a strong part of popular culture of not only India and the rest of the Indian subcontinent, but also of the Middle East, parts of Africa, parts of Southeast Asia, and among the South Asian diaspora worldwide.

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persist fortdauern, anhalten

hub Mittel-, Angelpunkt

diasporaDiaspora (Minderheitensituation)

Genre conventions

Most Bollywood films would be classified as musicals. Few movies are made without at least one song-and-dance number. However, they do not fit easily in the "musical" category as defined by Hollywood movies; they usually contain a great deal more in the way of plot and action than is found in the typical Hollywood musical.Indian audiences expect full value for their money, with a good entertainer generally referred to as paisa vasool, (literally, "money's worth"). Songs and dances, love triangles, comedy and dare-devil thrills—all are mixed up in a three-hour-long extravaganza with an intermission. Such movies are called masala movies, after the Hindi word for a spice mixture, masala. Like masalas, these movies are a mixture of many things.Plots tend to be melodramatic. They frequently employ formulaic ingredients such as star-crossed lovers and angry parents, love triangles, corrupt politicians, kidnappers, …

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Bollywood song and dance

Songs from Bollywood movies are generally pre-recorded by professional playback singers, with the actors then lip synching the words to the song on-screen, often while dancing. While most actors, especially today, are excellent dancers, few are also singers. The dancing in Bollywood films, especially older ones, is primarily modeled on Indian dance: classical dance styles and folk dances. In modern films, Indian dance elements often blend with Western dance styles (as seen on MTV or in Broadway musicals), though it is not unusual to see Western pop and pure classical dance numbers side by side in the same film. Songs typically comment on the action taking place in the movie, in several ways. Sometimes, a song is worked into the plot, so that a character has a reason to sing; other times, a song is an externalization of a character's thoughts.

sync(h)= short for synchronizationblendsich vermischenexternalizationVerkörperung

Dialogues and lyrics

The film script (frequently credited as "dialogues") and the song lyrics are often written by different people. The dialogues are mostly written in Hindi, with use of Urdu in situations which require poetic dialogues. Contemporary mainstream movies also make great use of English. Dialogues are often melodramatic and invoke God, family, mother, duty, and self-sacrifice liberally.

Urduan old indogermanic language used in India and Pakistanmelodramaticoveremotional (melodramatisch)invokeanrufen, beschwörensacrificeopfern

Cast and crew

Bollywood employs people from all parts of India. It attracts thousands of aspiring actors and actresses, all hoping for a break in the industry. Models and beauty contestants, television actors, theatre actors and even common people come to Mumbai with the hope and dream of becoming a star. Just as in Hollywood very few succeed.Stardom in the entertainment industry is very fickle, and Bollywood is no exception. The popularity of the stars can rise and fall rapidly, based on single movies. Very few people become national icons, who are unaffected by success or failure of their movies, like Amitabh Bachchan.

aspire streben, trachten

contestant Wettkämpfer(in),

Finances

Bollywood budgets are usually modest by Hollywood standards. Sets, costumes, special effects, and cinematography were less than world-class up until the mid-to-late 1990s. But as Western films and television gain wider distribution in India itself, there is increasing pressure for Bollywood films to attain the same production levels.Bollywood sold 3.6 billion tickets for $1.3 billion (USD), whereas Hollywood films sold 2.6 billion tickets for $51 billion (USD).

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List of popular Bollywood films

Sarkar - (2005) Said to be inspired by the "Godfather" trilogy. Paheli - (2005) Stars Shahrukh Khan and Rani Mukherji, directed by Amol Palekar. This film was selected as India's official entry to the 2006 Oscars." Black - (2005) An inspired teacher, played by Amitabh Bachchan, reaches out to a deaf and blind girl played by Rani Mukherji. Inspired by the life of Helen Keller and the film The Miracle Worker. Devdas (2002): Yet another film rendition of the classic Bengali novel by Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay. Lagaan (Tax) (2001) (a. k. a.: Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India). The Film was a Academy Award nominee for Best Foreign Film. Mother India (1957): Heroic peasant woman (Nargis) does her duty towards her husband and sons despite heart-breaking obstacles. Sikander (1941): Stars Prithviraj Kapoor.

© Viktoria Selb (7a)