61. Defining Commercial Cinema

Few days ago, I went to a friend's place for dinner. We were discussing something related to our profession. His wife and kid were also sitting there. We were discussing things while eating and as usual, what happens in normal house the TV was on and some south Indian film with Jnr. NTR was running on it. We weren't too keen to watch it. TV was on for perfunctory reasons for it being 'On'. Suddenly there was some action scene and we started watching it. We were watching it because it was so illogical and funny at the same time, not to mention entertaining that we couldn't take our eyes off it. After ten minutes, we were into the film, the whole family. Later, we watched the film for another half an hour before we came to our senses and changed the channel. It was only later that I realized something about the film and our behavior, which I discussed with my friend too, to which he just noded. So I decided to write about it.

The film was illogical, stupid and events were happening at such a lightning speed it actually kept us glued to the television screen. I wondered what was it that made us so interested in that film with a bulky over weight hero? Whatever it was, I think ( rather believe) it was actually the power of commercial cinema.

The word commercial is self explanatory. It comes from commerce. Commerce involves money. So basically, anything that makes money is called commercial. The need for defining it has come from the fact that I have met many producers in my course of struggle and they all insist on making commercial cinema, which makes sense because one needs to get returns for their investments.

When I was film virgin in the Mumbai city I used to hate that word. Because the mere mention of word commercial reeked of compromises in the art of film making. That is what I thought. So, called intellectual film makers in the world don't have their films doing business worth of millions. That belonged to commercial films, they don't compromise, they just make the content that sells. So a misconception breaded in the mind of people that film making is commercial when it is made from the perspective of audience. That was a basic observation because if people are liking it then instead of conceptualizing the theory that the director made a good film, we instead emphasized that film making must be done from audience point of view. Then laziness prevailed and next thing we knew we were seeing same kinds of films all the time. A method was developed out of human need to develop a science and a set of rules for creating a film whose probability of raking in moolah was not 99% but 100%. No one ever succeeded in that.

What made that Jnr. NTR film a commercial. It has an entertaining factor because in every scene something physical is happening, i don't have to use my mind to understand anything. Everything is obvious. The reason South Indian films work is because the events in the film are moving so fast that you don't have the time to analyze the impracticality of the situation happening in the film. In the film, we are able to see things that we are unable to see in real life, it is beyond real life and it si larger than real life, which makes it more interesting.

'Gangs of Wasseypur' was not a commercial film, though it is highly regarded as good cinema but it didn't bring the money in. It worked somehow to an extent and it worked primarily because the events we were seeing in the film were unrelated to what we see in real life. They were funny and the murders, stealing, fights were shown in a way that most audience was unfamiliar of. We don't see murders happening like that. So it basically comes down to the fact that commercial cinema is about showing to audience what they haven't seen before but something they would like to see. Show them new things and they are game for it. But don't go too far or they will reject it. If you show BDSM in your film they won't like it because they cannot relate to it and might feel repulsed but it. Audience must be able to imagine what they are going to see and it needs to be around the periphery of their mind and experiance when you show it to them first. The reason Jurassic park worked was because people already knew about Dinosaurs but they haven't seen it in front of their eyes. It was like their imaginations were coming true.

In most of the films, the hero wins in the end. The right and sanity prevails. Why does he always has to win? Because that's what we desire in our real lives and that's something that is not a part of our real lives. So, we need to see a world, hypothetical though, to see a world where right wins all the time, no matter what. In my childhood, I used to think that what is shown in film is actually how one should lead his life because it is an ideal life. Never running after girls, studying, being good to everyone but somehow that doesn't work in real life. What they were showing in films was what we expect to happen but it will not happen and that is why it is there in the film.

Creating Commercial cinema is an exciting piece of art and one should not hide his capabilities of unable to make a commercial behind art films. If your films don't money, sooner or later you are out, no matter how many awards you get.