by Shaheen Darr

Created on: September 24, 2008   Last Updated: March 12, 2011

In 1913, a soundless film called Raja Harishchandra with both Hindi and English subititles was produced in India by Dadasaheb Phalke. Being the first Indian director to produce soundless movies, he got his inspiration from the Lumiere Brothers who had introduced soundless movie clips to India in 1899.

The industry soon took off and the 1920s saw the rise of several film directors trying their hand at making silent Indian movies. It was in 1931 when the first sound film Alam Ara was produced and its success inspired directors in South India and various other parts of India including Bengal to also start producing films. Gradually the rest of India joined in the bollywood race and films started to be produced with political and social themes of the era. The name bollywood was a combination of Hollywood and Bombay (Mumbai) which was at the heart of Indian film production.

In 1932, Bombay hosted the first Indian film festival inspiring Indian directors like Satyajit Ray and Mrinal Sen to introduce Indian films to the world cinematic audiences. Gradually colour films were produced and the director K.Asif directed the classic film Mughal-E-Azam which was based on the life of the great Mughal Emperor Akbar and his son Salim (Jehangir). Film actors like Raj Kapoor, Dalip Kumar, Manoj Kumar and actresses like Nargis, Vyjantimala and Saira Banu became household names in the 1960s. Not only the film actors but the playback singers who sang the songs for these films like Lata Mangeshkar and Mohammed Rafi became popular all around the world.

The film industry was the ideal media not only to entertain but to educate the masses about all sorts of issues that affected India and its people. Events in Indian history were reflected in Bollywood films and the Independence of India from Britain and the resulting partition of India and Pakistan and its effects were shown in patriotic films like Shaheed which was directed by Ramesh Sehgal. Subjects of poverty of  rural India and the power of family values was the subject of the film 'Mother India' starring the actress Nargis. The film made by Mehmoob Khan was an outright success and broke all box office records in India..

The 1980s brought in films with lots of violence and Amitabh Bachan became the 'angry young man' fighting injustices against corrupt leaders and politicians. Films were churned out in large numbers with over 800 films being produced in this period. Gradually themes changed and family issues and social values

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