Page 18 - From Bombay to Bollywoord The Making of a Global Media Industri

Introduction >> 5

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has completely changed in its shape, form and mode of dispersal.” So
what does cinema post-1995 look like? The snapshot that Singh presented
is worth quoting:

Take the case of a recent film, Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham (K3G). Along-
side his transnational presence in the film, Shahrukh Khan flows uninter-
rupted and simultaneous into a Pepsi ad on Star Plus, a rerun of Baazigar
on Sony TV into an Ericsson ad in the Times of India, only to reappear
on the upper left corner of the MSN Hotmail India screensaver. Amitabh
Bachchan plays an aging corporate scion and benevolently distributes
money and a few minutes of fame to the Indian middle class on Kaun
Banega Crorepati? (Who Wants to Be a Crorepati?). K3G the film, itself
appears in only a fraction of the cinema halls in any of the big Indian cities
on the day of its release, simultaneously screened with a shaky and uncer-
tain print on TV by various cablewallahs (cable TV entrepreneurs), flood-
ing various electronic bazaars soon after as an easily copied VCD, its songs
long-since released (and “pirated”) on CD and cassette. 11

To this account, we could add that K3G’s songs were available on various
peer-to-peer networks and websites like raaga.com and smashits.com the
day after the music was officially released. Web portals such as rediff.com
created slideshows (offering behind-the-scenes stills, interviews, gossip, etc.)
and hosted online chat sessions with the stars that were attended by fans
across the world. Within a few days of the film’s release, pirated copies were
in circulation all over the world and available, for instance, at South Asian
grocery stores across North America. And at the cinema hall in Boston
where I saw the film (first day first show, no less), the audience, comprised
mostly of Indian immigrants, stood up reverentially when Krish (Shahrukh
Khan’s son in K3G) led his British schoolmates in a rendition of the Indian
national anthem.
Snapshots such as these are interesting not only because they serve as
useful entry points for thinking about the ways in which the object that we
term “cinema” has changed dramatically. More important, they highlight
how India’s mediaspace is defined by rapidly evolving, complex, and often
surprising connections within and among industry practices, state policy,
new media technologies and platforms, and spaces of consumption and par-
ticipation that criss-cross regional, national, and transnational boundaries
and affiliations. In this context, to suggest that film shares deep connections
with radio, television, and digital media seems to state the obvious. Yet, apart
from brief mentions of radio and television as important sites for audiences’