Bollywood takes real to reel inspiration

Real-life incidents are inspiring more plots of Hindi movies, reflecting Bollywood's gradual move towards a more naturalistic form of cinema.

After spotlighting police corruption in last month's Department, Ram Gopal Varma is working on a film based on the 2008 Mumbai attacks.

Sanjay Gupta's forthcoming crime film Shootout at Wadala chronicles the Mumbai police's first registered shoot-out in 1982. He has even obtained permission to name his characters after the policemen involved in the incident.

Kabeer Kaushik is gearing up for the release of his thriller Maximum next week. The film, starring Sonu Sood, is set in Mumbai during the early 2000s, when ties between the Indian land mafia and politicians were at their strongest.

Sood believes the increasing number of crimes in India has propelled this new form of cinema.

"Filmmakers are getting more material," he said. "They're hunting for things happening around them."

Other directors using real-life events in their work include Kumar Mangat, who's making a film about the 1970s Indian serial killer Charles Sobhraj, and Rakesh Ranjan Kumar, whose forthcoming film Marksheet tackles scams in India's education sector.

Dibaker Banerjee, who focused on corruption in Indian politics in his film Shanghai, says he's glad audiences are supporting reality-based cinema. "An alternative has opened up," he said. "People are willing to make and watch these fresh films."

* IANS