Of late, except for the notable exceptions like Marathi filmmaker Sandeep Sawant's the regional cinema’s performance has been grossly unsatisfactory. With strikes, and Bollywood’s increasing influence on them, vernacular cinema has lost its true essence.
Take the example of Kannada film industry; there is nothing much to talk about it except the strike demanding the ban on the release of other languages film in the state.
On the other hand Marathi film industry, which boasts of legends like Dadasaheb Phalke and V Shantaram to thinking directors like Vijaya Mehta and Amol Palekar, is on its last legs, despite Shwaas.
Bengali film industry, one of the oldest members of the filmmaking, is no better than others. As most of the Bengali filmmakers have started looking outside the regional boundaries and heavily baking upon Bollywood for greater reach and recognition. The list includes the veteran filmmakers like Rituparano Ghosh, Budhadeb Das Gupta.
Despite its regular art house success the filmmakers like Adoor Gopalakrishnan failed to bring back the glory of Malyalam Cinema.
Every cloud has a silver lining and one hopes that the regional filmmakers, who have disappointed in the year 2004, glorify the image of vernacular cinema by filling the quotient with meaningful films.
- Arpana