REINVENTING THE ROOTS

WITH SCARCE SCREENS, TIGHT BUDGETS, AND RISING OTT PRESSURE, REGIONAL CINEMA HAS FOUGHT TO STAY AFLOAT—BUT SIGNS OF A REVIVAL ARE EMERGING.

- MANOJ SHARMA, SAMALI BASU GUHA, AND ASHUTOSH KUMAR

THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC brought the world to a screeching halt in 2020. Among the areas affected was film production. Since then, global movie production has surpassed pre-pandemic levels. According to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), in 2023, the latest year for which full global data exists, as many as 9,571 films were produced worldwide, compared to just 5,485 in 2020, and 9,205 in 2019. India leads the list, with 2,562 films being produced in 2023, says WIPO data.

While Bollywood and the film industries in the South seem to be riding this wave, those in the North and East are undergoing a phase of reckoning and recognition. For instance, Bengal is caught in the flux between its rich storied past and a rapidly changing entertainment landscape. Meanwhile, the Punjabi film industry remains largely boxed in by comedy and repetitive, formulaic storytelling. And while the Bhojpuri film industry has grown, it is still looking for a film to take to a national audience.

For these industries, the challenge is to strike a balance between nostalgia and reinvention, as well as between rooted storytelling and commercial viability. The following narratives explore what is happening on the ground.

The Bengal chapter

“Cinema is a matter of what's in the frame and what's out,” U.S. filmmaker Martin Scorsese had said once. That question was mulled multiple times during the six-year restoration journey by Scorsese’s The Film Foundation that led to the re-release of Satyajit Ray's Aranyer Din Ratri (Days and Nights in the Forest) as part of the Cannes Classics in 2025, 55 years after the film was originally released.