Globalizing Bombay Cinema

Abstract

This article examines the changing relations between Bombay cinema and the Indian state in a global context. In 1998, the Indian state recognized film as an industry. This dramatic shift in state policy occurred during the same period as two other noteworthy developments. First, the Bombay film industry produced and successfully distributed what the Indian state and the audiences approvingly referred to as ‘family films’. Second, Indian diasporic communities emerged as valued audiences in Bombay's box-office figures and as desired investors in the Indian state's political, economic, and cultural plans. By examining this historical conjuncture, I seek to show how processes of globalization contribute to the (re)production of Hindi commercial cinema, the Indian state and family.