| This website is a part of a larger project that looks
at the circulation of the Hong Kong action films in India to understand
the social and political space occupied by the cinema in India.
The circulation of the Hong Kong film in India presents an interesting
set of problems for the study of not only Indian as well as Hong
Kong cinemas but also for film theory in general. The career of
the Hong Kong action film in India demonstrates that the object
of critical analysis is not merely the individual film text or even
a genre but the institution of the cinema and its imbrication with
other constituents of the public domain. This is at once a study
of Indian audiences’ engagement with the cinema and simultaneously
an examination of the Indian film industry—distribution and
exhibition sectors in particular.
The project focusses on Andhra Pradesh since the 1980s. Andhra
Pradesh is the largest market for film (included imported film)
in India. In this part of the country, as in the neighbouring south
Indian states of Tamilnadu and Karnataka, the cinema has a long
history of association with the politics of linguistic identity.
One obvious manifestation is the presence of highly organized fans’
associations of film stars, which continuously reminds us that films
here are more than ‘only entertainment.’ Hong Kong film
stars do not have fans’ associations in Andhra Pradesh. The
index of the popularity of the Hong Kong action film in India is
not the missing fans’ association but its huge success in
what I call the ‘B circuit’ or the lowest rungs of the
distribution and exhibition chains. The B circuit circulation of
Hong Kong action film coupled with its direct implication in the
emergence of new forms of popular literature, but more importantly
the obvious linkages between Hong Kong martial arts films and martial
arts academies, points to the strong roots sprung by the import
in India. This, of course, is fairly obvious. The question however
is: what kind of an entity is the cinema in India? The objective
of this website is to demonstrate the breadth of this question.
| Hong Kong action
film and popular culture |
| Popular culture in Andhra Pradesh is replete with examples
of quotations of and references to the Hong the Kong action
film. To name these gestures to the Hong Kong film as influence
is to foreclose the relationship between local popular cultures
and the import. |
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| The Context |
| The context in which films are watched in Andhra Pradesh tells
us a great deal about what Miriam Hansen calls the ‘social
dimension’ of cinema. |
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| The B Circuit |
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| Jet Li Comes to Madanapalle |
| It is in the B circuit that the imbrication of
the Hong Kong action film with local film cultures
becomes evident. ‘B circuit’ is the
label I give to the segment of distribution and
exhibition sectors that is characterized by low
levels of investment. Further, this segment is characterized
by repeated interventions by both distributors and
exhibitors, which results in the de-standardization
of a film’s status as an industrial product.
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