Screening magic

Dhundiraj Govind Phalke, popularly known as Dada Saheb Phalke, was responsible for producing India's first fully indigenous silent feature film Raja Harishchandra. This heralded the birth of the Indian film industry. The film had titles in Hindi and English and was released in 1913 in Bombay, today renamed Mumbai. In 1917, West Bengal saw the birth of its first feature film – Satyabadi Raja Harishchandra. And the first feature film of South India – Keechaka Vadham – was made in 1919. After stepping into 1920s, Indian cinema gradually assumed the shape of a regular industry. The birth of sound in films came with a bang and quickly displaced silent movies. The first Indian talkie – Alam Ara – was released in 1931 in Bombay.

The first International Film Festival of India was held in Bombay in 1952. Another turning point in the Indian industry came in 1955 with the arrival of Satyajit Ray and his classic Pather Panchali which opened up a new path leading Indian films on to the world film scene. International recognition followed with the Cannes and other foreign awards. While the '50s saw some distinguished films (Do Bigha Zamin, Boot Polish, Mother India, Pyaasa and Kagaz Ke Phool), the '60s was a decade of mediocre films made mostly to please the distributors and to some extent, meet the demands of the box office.

However, among the regional languages, Malayalam cinema derived much of its strength from literature during this period. Malayalam cinema hit the headlines for the first time when Ramu Kariat's Chemmeen (1965) won the President's Gold Medal. It has been a long story of nearly nine decades since the start with early shaky screen images to full-length feature films from a mammoth empire that has yielded about 27,000 feature films and thousands of documented short films.

Today, India is considered the largest film producer in the world with the Hindi film industry referred to as Bollywood on the lines of Hollywood. Sites on the subject though are not half as spicy as some of the plots churned out by this inimitable industry.

www.indiatalkies.com
Do not be alarmed if on typing this address you are taken to a URL that reads http://movies.sify.com/ You are at the right place. Clear and comprehensive, "an ocean of information", this is indiatalkies. It provides details that date back to the 1900 covering topics like Indian cinema, video, TV industry, with articles on directors, producers, technicians, movies, organisations and more related to the industry. The site also lists Moviezone, Bollywood, Tamil, Telegu, Malayalam, Reviews, Screen savers, Hot 'n' happening, Life stories, Tete-a-tete, Interview your star, Star address book, which are interesting and informative.

www.indiamovies.com
It's quick and comprehensive with colourful graphics. Offers a detailed list of Movie clips, Thousands of movie songs, Wallpapers, Photo gallery, Newsreel, Celeb speak, In my own words, Bollywood, Chartbusters, Hollywood update, Check it out, Film India worldwide, Opinion polls, Chat, Filmi timepass and much more. The Filmi timepass with dialogue baazi, filmi cliches, quotable quotes, insult a friend Dharminder ishtyle is sure to bring a smile to your face. (Under Top 10 cliches of all time – Duniyaki koi bhi takat hume juda nahi kar sakti :) and Tapkaade saale ko will surely have you *lol* or laugh out loudly). An easy place to hang around and spend hours.

www.indiaatlas.com/entertainment/cinema.htm
At first glance it's text heavy and drab. Considering it's about movies, the magic seems to be missing. But then the emphasis is on utility with hyperlinks to everything listed on the homepage. It details different Internet sites on Indian cinema (indiatalkies.com), list of actors and actresses, directors, bollywood (bollywoodonline.com and indiabollywood.com – details on movies and people), Tamil cinema (tamilcinema.com – on Tamil cinema in Tamil, tamiltalkie.com – official site of Mani Rathnam's Madras Talkies), organisations (ABCL, AVM, National Film Development Corporation or NFDC, Rajshri Pictures, Yashraj Films, etc.)
Of these, NFDC (www.nfdc.com) is for the serious student of Indian film industry as it's the central agency in India promoting quality cinema. It offers details on import procedures, copyright and censorship laws in India, shooting films in India etc.
But for true movie buffs who want hot gossip and the latest reviews once a movie is released (like Mission Kashmir, Mohabbatein in India, it's www.rediff.com/entertai/enthome.htm and www.pcufi/tmo/bollyw.htm (with 58 links to all major sites related to cinema).
And for those who'd like to know the fate of these two much-awaited Big B/Shah Rukh Khan and Hrithik Roshan starrers, Mohabbatein is forging ahead in India and abroad proving yet again the Indian audiences' love for love.