Seeker very nice points!

And if you read that article in time magazine few yrs back you will realize the ridiculous taste westerners have for hindi films. well maybe not ridiculous but MUCH DIFFERENT.

Oscars foreign movie category seems either a political play or simply a western judge looking through its own cultural lenses to consider what is nomination-worthy. What they consider great would inevitably be colored by their own cultural reality. When Lagaan was nominated a few years ago, even though I considered it pretty close to a win-worthy movie, I couldn’t see how it would win – people look weird, what the heck is it with the song & dance, and western audience can’t possibly be expected to ‘get’ the unity-in-diversity message down to the specifics of various religious, caste, background representations etc. On the other hand, in addition to great story-telling, it was these extras that made the movie memorable for me.

Another example is one I heard on NPR a year ago or so. They reviewed a CD on ‘best of bollywood’ compiled by some western source. Holy cow, it had some horrible songs! And of course the reviewer went on about how each song meant this or that for a first time bollymusic listener. And I kept thinking – some songs here are shit! Most desis in the world have never heard or liked these and here they are representing hundred of thousands of bolly songs…

So anyway, I don’t think water is the best hindi entry to the oscars, and I don’t think its win-worthy. I really hope we don’t keep sending nonsense to the oscars and hope the selection committee doesn’t finally hand out one on account of being tired with constant desi push and politics. If Rang de Basanti were entered however, it would be a different matter altogether.

Let’s make it clear: Water was not a bad movie. It was decent. But much like Crash last year (which was also decent, but which at no point when I was watching did I think “wow, this is the best movie I’ve seen this year), it is not a great movie, and it should not be getting these honors. Whereas Rang de Basanti was one of the bext movies that I have seen in years, English or not. What a travesty.

You guys already put it best when pointing to Shubhra Gupta’s article here. http://www.sepiamutiny.com/sepia/archives/004122.html

…these sort of movies perpetuate a certain impression of India…

…it definitely cements their general notions that Indians are nothing then women exploiting, cow worshiping evil snake charmers

I have problems with ideas like this, or the worrying about whether “Westerners” get outdated or incorrect or incomplete notions of [insert foreign country here]. I remember hearing someone say similar things about “City of God,” where someone was worried that it perpetuated the image of nothing but poverty- and crime-ridden favelas in Brazil, etc.

In cases like that, I’m adamant that it’s not the filmmaker’s problem if the audience/viewer is ignorant or parochial about world affairs, history, or current events! You can’t educate the entire American public (or even the small fraction that go to films like this) in the space of two hours. A writer/filmmaker can’t worry about every detail: “How will this look to the average white Texan?” Trying to “represent” the length and breadth of an entire culture/country/history in a single work of art is an impossible burden to place on someone. In most cases, you’re telling the story of a handful of individuals, not an entire population; thus I think the artist just needs to try to be as responsible to as s/he can in telling that individual’s story. That being said, some plotlines are tired and inaccurate, and thanks to those who noted that Mehta’s closing credits may have been misleading about modern conditions.