Anurag Kashyap says Netflix, Amazon’s content is ‘worse than television’; criticises Bollywood for being creatively bankrupt: ‘When you hit rock-bottom’

Filmmaker Anurag Kashyap expressed dismay at the state of the Indian streaming industry, and described it as 'worse than television'.

By: Entertainment Desk

New Delhi | May 16, 2025 10:59 AM IST

Anurag Kashyap calls pan-India film a "massive scam."

Filmmaker Anurag Kashyap, who expected a new wave of freedom to sweep over the Indian film industry after the arrival of streaming platforms, expressed his dismay at how things have turned out. He said that the type of material that these platforms are producing is ‘worse than television’, as he revealed what feedback he often gets. In an interview, Anurag said that platforms such as Netflix and Prime Video are driven by only one goal. “They’re looking for subscriptions and profits. They have an algorithm that they follow,” he said.

In an interaction with The Hindu, Anurag looked back on his earliest collaborations with Netflix, the crime drama series Sacred Games and the anthology film Lust Stories. He said, “When we did Sacred Games and Lust Stories, when Netflix came in, we thought this was an opportunity. And it seemed like an opportunity; we created some very good work with them. And then, slowly, roughly around the time of Covid, everything turned around again. Now what they’re doing is worse than television. Now you go in there, and they want to dumb you down. At the end of the day, all these companies, whether it’s Netflix or Amazon or Apple, they’re coming to India because data is the new oil.”

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Anurag continued, “Subscription is what they’re looking for. With a 1.4 billion population, they want to maximise their subscription. They want to reach out to everyone, they don’t want to offend anyone. They don’t want to create art or cinema, they’re creating content. They’re creating content to feed to everybody, the man on the street. And they’re very happy that people are watching their shows on a cellphone.”

Anurag has previously said that a third season of Sacred Games was being planned, but was cancelled by Netflix after the Prime Video show Tandav attracted backlash. He was also developing an adaptation of the book Maximum City, and was heartbroken when the project was cancelled as well. In earlier interviews, Anurag has said that he slipped into a mental health spiral following this setback, which he has since emerged out of. To The Hindu, he said that the streaming industry relies entirely on an algorithm to make creative decisions. “This is the argument that I give them, and they’ll say, ‘Our algorithm tells us otherwise’. You can’t argue with that. I’ve noticed over 30 years in this industry, everybody starts off as a disrupter. I was a disrupter, Netflix was a disrupter, all studios were disrupters. The only way you could draw attention was by disrupting the system. And slowly, when they get into the system, they become the system,” he said.

He was also asked about the Hindi film industry in general, and he said, “The industry is very confused. If there was a dependency on the Khans still, then it would be working. They aren’t doing anything original, and they don’t know what to do right now. They’re still figuring their path out, and when you hit rock bottom is when you start to evolve. Bollywood is in a downward phase, and it’ll evolve.” Anurag had previously declared that he is done with Bollywood, and was considering a move to the south. More recently, he said that he has shifted base to Kerala, which is where he feels the most daring Indian films are currently being made. He is also balancing a career as an actor in South Indian films.

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