Tigmanshu Dhulia criticises ‘bekaar’ Hindi film heroes, says gatekeepers of Bollywood saw real India only on ‘papa ki shooting’

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He then spoke about the ‘big tragedy of Indian cinema’, and offered his theory about why it’s on the decline. “After the Partition, people from all over came to Mumbai. Lahore had a film industry, Bengal still has a film industry. In Maharashtra alone, there were studios in Kolhapur and Pune. Bimal Roy came to Mumbai, Hrishikesh Mukherjee came to Mumbai, the Anand brothers and Prithviraj Kapoor came from Punjab… They brought their stories and culture with them. Then, they had children, and their children got married and settled down in Mumbai.”

He continued, “These people were from Mumbai. They never saw the rest of India. They only time they’d go to Kashmir was probably to watch papa’s shooting. They travelled to London and New York. These children made films from their understanding of films; there should be a hero, songs, etc. The lack of evolution that we speak of, the emergence of formula films, stems from this.”

Tigmanshu said that things changed in the early 2000s, when a new batch of filmmakers, including himself, came to Mumbai from small cities. But he held his own tribe responsible as well for having succumbed to ‘greed’ over the years. Tigmanshu didn’t spare audiences either, and said that compared to two decades ago, the consumers have become more ‘bewakoof’.

Tigmanshu Dhulia broke out with the film Haasil, and has since directed movies such as Paan Singh Tomar and Saheb, Biwi, Aur Gangster. More recently, he branched out into the streaming space, but said in this interview that even that industry is struggling now, after the boom that it witnessed during the pandemic.