"The aim of these awards is to recognise the excellent work been done by our fraternity in the past year." A simple enough motto which the Academy tries to follow year-after-year, as the eagerly awaited Oscars send expectations soaring and the theatrical business to a thumping rise. While Hollywood has always been known to set a benchmark for the business side of cinema, the remarkable persuasion with which it has kept a tradition going for 83 years is highly admirable. Yes, it has been 83 years since the first academy awards were doled out, and they still remain as hihgly anticipated as ever! So much so, that the academy awards are THE awards in the US, not the Golden Globes, not any of the numerous film society awards. This is called consolidating a business idea linked to the appreciation of art and milking it to the desired extent.
Not be left behind, of course, India has its own tradition, one which raises a few chuckles each year as a plethora of 'awards' are handed out from exotic foreign locales, mostly to just counter the viewership of the rival channel. While the Filmfare awards are considered to be the equivalent of the Oscars, a glance at the past winners would surely dishearten the advocates of cinematic excellence in India. But I am not going to talk about the disasterous choices made by the Filmfare awards committee (Dabangg is apparently the best Bollywood could come up with in 2010, when there have been 50-odd Dabangg's made in a year alone during the 70s). India deserves to be appluaded for a peculiar trait of its, the noble desire of setting up a tradition to be followed. Be it the Green revolution, the promulgation of the nuclear programme or the invention of free and fair elections, we do our best at setting up a tradition. A similar tradition was set up in the mid-20th century to recognise excellence in motion arts in India, the National film awards.
Logic would suggest that the awards given out under the umbrella of the I&B ministry would be of paramount importance in our country, because they would perhaps remain neutral and not pander to the numerous camps and stars of our notorious film industry. Sadly, they are not! Not only is a large proportion of our population unaware of the existence of such awards (I would treat anybody who could name the movie for which Mithunda won his best actor award), the awards themselves have lost their essence while distinguishing between 'critics' and 'popular' choice awards. Please pause for a moment to reflect on this idea: A single committee of dubious members, who are in the good books of our ruling class, and entrusted with the responsibility of deciding the cinematic merits as well as the popular choice. Wow, seems like they could use a medal or two for their valor and big-heartedness. As a result, the awards carry no value for most outside the paradigm of the Art cinema, which in itself is a fading star with the advent of multiplex-audience.
Will an Indian producer ever dare to market a movie as-'Nominated for 3 national awards', or 'Winner of the National award for best supporting actress'.?Definitely not. Do you see similar tags with a number of foreign films released in India? Yes, you do. The idea behind both is not very different, the execution is another beast altogether. Can we not linearize the National awards, make them more appealing as well as highly coveted amongst our film fraternity (by coveted, I mean the real desire, not a PR stunt which our filmstars are prone to)? Can we move above the bush league for once? Can we stop making a big deal about no Indian movie fit enough to win an Oscar? Yes we can, if we can clean up our National awards.
Not be left behind, of course, India has its own tradition, one which raises a few chuckles each year as a plethora of 'awards' are handed out from exotic foreign locales, mostly to just counter the viewership of the rival channel. While the Filmfare awards are considered to be the equivalent of the Oscars, a glance at the past winners would surely dishearten the advocates of cinematic excellence in India. But I am not going to talk about the disasterous choices made by the Filmfare awards committee (Dabangg is apparently the best Bollywood could come up with in 2010, when there have been 50-odd Dabangg's made in a year alone during the 70s). India deserves to be appluaded for a peculiar trait of its, the noble desire of setting up a tradition to be followed. Be it the Green revolution, the promulgation of the nuclear programme or the invention of free and fair elections, we do our best at setting up a tradition. A similar tradition was set up in the mid-20th century to recognise excellence in motion arts in India, the National film awards.
Logic would suggest that the awards given out under the umbrella of the I&B ministry would be of paramount importance in our country, because they would perhaps remain neutral and not pander to the numerous camps and stars of our notorious film industry. Sadly, they are not! Not only is a large proportion of our population unaware of the existence of such awards (I would treat anybody who could name the movie for which Mithunda won his best actor award), the awards themselves have lost their essence while distinguishing between 'critics' and 'popular' choice awards. Please pause for a moment to reflect on this idea: A single committee of dubious members, who are in the good books of our ruling class, and entrusted with the responsibility of deciding the cinematic merits as well as the popular choice. Wow, seems like they could use a medal or two for their valor and big-heartedness. As a result, the awards carry no value for most outside the paradigm of the Art cinema, which in itself is a fading star with the advent of multiplex-audience.
Will an Indian producer ever dare to market a movie as-'Nominated for 3 national awards', or 'Winner of the National award for best supporting actress'.?Definitely not. Do you see similar tags with a number of foreign films released in India? Yes, you do. The idea behind both is not very different, the execution is another beast altogether. Can we not linearize the National awards, make them more appealing as well as highly coveted amongst our film fraternity (by coveted, I mean the real desire, not a PR stunt which our filmstars are prone to)? Can we move above the bush league for once? Can we stop making a big deal about no Indian movie fit enough to win an Oscar? Yes we can, if we can clean up our National awards.
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