Just a thought.. Cinema in India was introduced by a Marathi known as Dada Saheb Phakle.. So I guess Amitabh or Sinha wouoldn't exist if there was no cinema in India
RE:Just a thought before people start hating each other...
by on Feb 25, 2008 07:27 PM Permalink
Let's give credit where it's due.
While there were some theatre personalities in Calcutta who tried to document their plays, it is Dhundiraj Govind Phalke (1870 - 1944), affectionately called Dadasaheb Phalke, who was the first to make a full-length feature film, is the Father of Indian Cinema.
He was the son of a Sanskrit scholar, who studied at J J College of Art in Bombay and at Kala Bhavan, Baroda. He then studied architecture and became proficient as a landscape painter of academic nature studies.
He also tried his hand at photography, learned three-colour block making and ceramics, worked as a portrait photographer, stage make-up man, assistant to a German illusionist and as a magician! While he was to become a printer he saw a film called The Life of Christ.
He was sufficiently charged to believe that an indigenous film industry could be established by tackling Indian themes. At the heart of his career as a filmmaker was his fervent belief in the nationalistic philosophy of swadeshi, which advocated that Indians should take charge of their own economy in the in an independent India.
"Like the life of Christ we shall make pictures on Rama and Krishna."
Raising a loan from an old friend and pledging his life insurance, Phalke sailed for England on February 1, 1912 and returned two weeks later to launch Raja Harishchandra.
RE:RE:Just a thought before people start hating each other...
by on Feb 25, 2008 07:45 PM Permalink
Raja Harishchandra was about an honest king who for the sake of his principles sacrificed his kingdom and family till the gods, impressed with his honesty, restored him to his former glory. Indian cinema has come a long way from its first silent feature film in 1913 directed by Dada Saheb Phalke.
The Dada Saheb Phalke Award is given annualy by the Indian Government in recognition of the outstanding contributions made in the field of Indian Cinema.
Since 1970, there have been 37 Awardees, including Film Director Shyam Benegal in 2006.
Though we have all heard of the Father of Indian Cinema, many do not know that he "died pennyless."
Neither the Film Industry, that coverts the Dada Saheb Phalke Award nor the Maharashtra Government, has ever paid any heed to his family.
But he was a Marathi manoos who set up his studio in Nasik (now Nashik) where Raj thackeray and his MNS recently struck body blows to our democratic fabric with their sons-of-the soil rhetoric.
