Bioscope has been used as the early name for
cinema, to describe a travelling movie theatre, or as a generic name for a film
camera (and sometimes a projector). I interpreted it loosely as a device to
peek into the past.
For kids growing up in 1980s India, it is also
the name of a squat, cylindrical machine (on a stand) with small windows in which you placed
your eyes to see a passing montage of photographs (usually bunched together in
a theme). I interpreted this as a collection of snippets that showed a
progression.
Somewhere this ‘Past + Progression’ got
collectively interpreted as ‘History’. To protect my reputation* as a Bollywood
Trivia Hunter not given to serious analysis, I added a ‘Frivolous’ before the
history.
[* among my 17 friends who have read my earlier
books diligently]
Everything* about this book is in ‘ten’. There
are ten chapters. Each chapter has ten points. Even the end-chapter boxes (yes,
those are my favourite usually!) have ten entries each.
This ‘coincidence’ is due to the fact that my
publisher – Hachette – has just completed ten years in India and is taking out –
wait for it – ten books to commemorate the occasion. That explains the stenciled
‘10’ on the cover and the (ahem) subtle ‘10’s on the cover, spine and back cover.
[* In a glaring oversight, there are only six
footnotes in the book. Should have been ten! Hopefully, readers will forgive
this oversight.]
The cover is a stunner. The ten is a die-cut ‘hole’
on the yellow top cover through which you can see part of a movie poster (see left) that’s
the ‘bottom cover’. I am usually a big fan of ebooks but I’d recommend a paper
version of this book, just for the cover.
The cover is designed by Bhavi Mehta and her absolutely
stunning portfolio can be seen here.
I wrote the book in one super-fast burst (June
to December 2017, including planning at the beginning and editing at the end) –
slightly shorter than even my first book (on cricket). Though I have been
toying with the idea of writing a ‘history’ of Hindi cinema using stories and
snippets for some time now.
The collection of stories and snippets for started
– very strangely – with a script that I was trying to write for a live show on
the history of Hindi cinema and its creators, characters, costumes, clichés and
what not. That show didn’t happen but the research helped!
The best part of writing a book is always the
editorial interactions. Given the breakneck speed of writing, the edits were full
of comments like:
-
“Not
clear, please rephrase.”
-
“Mention
two of the songs here.”
-
“Had
Gulzar spoken to him about the lyrics?”
-
“What
about mothers-in-law?”
-
And
my favourite: In the context of Indo-Pakistan wars, “Check. There was Hindustan
ki Kasam in 1972.”
The other part of the writing was ‘research’
which – in my case – means (a) watching movies on YouTube, (b) reading books
and magazines on cinema and (c) chatting with friends on movies. My go-to
people for (c) was this cool group of people, who have encyclopeadic knowledge
on everything in the universe including and certainly not restricted to Hindi
cinema. They are like a kind of Illuminati (but much more modest), who have
critiqued chapter drafts, improved my knowledge of modern Indian history and thrown
dialogues at me to fit into various obscure parts of the book.
The book is dedicated to them.
The chapters are interesting… I think. They
cover a wide range of subjects like:
-
A
history of box-office collections
-
Leading
pairs down the ages
-
The
stories behind the scripts
-
Legendary
composer-lyricist combinations
-
A
brief history of bad men
-
Expats
in Hindi cinema
-
How
the language of Hindi cinema has changed
-
Filmi
fashion highlights
-
Biopics
in Bollywood
-
A
Filmi History of Independent India i.e. how major historical events have been depicted
on screen.
My favourite chapter in the book is No. 7 – the
one on how the language of Hindi cinema has changed over the years, both
dialogues and songs. How people express love differently then and now, how they
come together and how they leave each other, how people pray… this chapter is
full of wild generalisations, interesting song selections and some silly jokes.
Had most fun writing it.
You can buy the ebook
on Amazon. Paper also on Amazon
and Flipkart.
(Psst… you can buy multiple copies and gift them.)
Comments
"if you are criticising media’s colouring this as a Hindu hate crime (when they have refused to do the same in the past when perpetrators come from other religion) you must be automatically in support of the rapist is a lie and a clever sleight of hand"
"if you ever tweeted “terror has no religion” and now if you are using the tag of Hindutva while discussing a rape and murder, then you sir, or madam, are a hypocrite with a dog in the fight."
The excerpt is from Mayuresh Didolkar at Swarajya Magazine https://swarajyamag.com/ideas/kathua-unnao-and-the-question-of-justice