[Reader-list] Realism and Cinema

[Manosh Chowdhury]

Hi! Rashmi, 
 
I am an illiterate person in this line. And hardly ever I responded in this forum. But 
the point you raised here just made me to engage a little. 
 
I think the dichotomy realism-melodrama is a misleading to approach the contemporary 
filmic genre, especically those in India. Even if the dichotomy had a merit in the previous 
days, which I am not much sure of, it should no more be considered as a viable binary. 
If we are to take seriously some productions during the last decade, and specifically made by kind of makers like Mani Ratnamin, the binary is simply invalid. In my consideration, there are at least two kinds of contemporary Mumbai cinema that clearly transgress the demarcation line of real and melodrama - if they could really be any comprehensible categories - 1. films those anticipated diasporaic viewers as its potential consumers; 2. films having a plot that set out on a "gross" political outlet of modern India [truely, with overt or covert references either to the colonial past or postcolonial relationship with Pakistan]. 
 
While I am saying this, I actually believe that a "melodrama" framework for reading Indian cinema could best supplement underestimating the power of the medium - both as a visual product and as vehichle of norms. Regarding the film you mentioned, Dev, I don't think the contradiction as secularism vs fundamentalism. At best, it could be named as terrorism vs patriotism in my understanding. And yet, the utmost mission of this film is to subscribe the virtue of a 'nationhood', hence the Indian one.
 
Hope we could continue. 
 
Kind regards               
manosh


Rashmi Sawhney <rashmi.sawhney at gmail.com> wrote:Thanks, Yousuf. I'll have a look at the book you suggest.
A specific question that I'm thinking about is about the dynamics
between realism and melodrama in Indian cinema. Could a film that uses
continuity editing, and a classic Hollywood style of realism as its
guiding cinematic technique also allow for the resolution of the
conflict in the plot/theme to occur outside a rational reality?
Perhaps using the modes of Indian melodrama? To take an example, a
film like Nihalani's Dev carefully follows classic Hollywood realist
guidelines, yet the dialogue between secularism/fundamentalism is
resolved only through the death of both ideologies (and their
signifiers).
Therefore, would Dev be more suitably classified as a realism-based or
melodrama-based film? Look forward to hearing some views.

Best,
Rashmi


		
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