Why no heroine oriented commercial entertainers in BW anymore? - Page 6

Originally posted by: atominis

This is a very valid comment.

I have seen male audience fed up seeing only woman dominated content on TV on all channels in daily soaps.

Overdose of female dominated content on TV may perhaps, indeed be a reason why people are not excited any more to watch female led films even if they are commercial entertainers.

Till 2000, we did not have satellite TV at every home and all channels did not have woman led daily soaps. Serials had men, children, youth too but it changed after popularity of K soaps.

And I agree, if someone has seen Naagin or saas bahu shows or love stories or marital disputes or woman struggling to achieve her dreams etc on TV already then why would they be keen to watch similar plots in films?

There was no TV at each home and no female led soaps when Nagina or Chandni, Chaalbaaz, Seeta Aur Geeta released.

Some films like Beta, HSSH would have no takers today given how it is a typical saas bahu stepmom saga that is there in every serial.

I also think TV may have kept female audience also more keen to watch content at home than especially go out to watch films in theatre. Or wait for TV premiere of few female led films made once in a while in Bollywood.

Woman led content is still fairly limited in its scope and stories and we do not have anything like, say Wonder Woman or Charlie's Angels type films in India.

TV is saturated with mainly women as heroines, vamps, supporting cast, onlookers, bystanders in every serial.

Definitely possible that saturation of female dominated content on TV has reduced anticipation for female led films on big screen now.

Bollywood has not even attempted to make something like Arundhati which is both female led yet a commercial entertainer type film. And I pity the bad job they did with a lone film on Jhansi ki Rani.

Love stories or family dramas or even revenge sagas may not work as much as they did till 2000s thanks to TV and also 24/7 movie channels on TV where old films have re runs every day. Why'd anyone watch similar films again if they see Chandni, Seeta aur Geeta, Chaalbaaz, Khoon Bhari Maang, Nagina, Nagin on TV every other day anyway?

The female led films need to widen their scope and go beyond typical crimes against women, marital disputes or dealing with a bad divorce or break up themes.

Thanks to popularity of mythological serials on TV there is no reason for films like Jai Santoshi Ma to set BO on fire nowadays or have the craze which that film had where audience actually threw flowers at screen or took off chappals outside before entering theatre as they believed as if they were actually going for devi darshan when going to watch that film.

It is definitely plausible that TV dented prospects for women led films. Especially given how no serial is about men nowadays so men still doing same stuff in masala or action films is still not as common to see for average viewer.

Thank you for your valuable input in the discussion.

Exactly.

There's more than one medium to serve the audience these days. Films, TV, YouTube, OTT platforms are the main branches. I separated YouTube and OTT because YouTube may have web shows, but it also has lots of independent creators who aim to satisfy a particular need in the audience (cooking, makeup, DIYs, construction, education etc). Whereas OTT has deals with production houses to make a series or films of which they acquire the rights for a period of time. This works similar to TV itself.

Men I know would either watch something light like Sab TV shows or reality shows like Kapil Sharma. But they won't watch any daily soaps because it is negative, regressive and to a great extent does cause problems in real life family dynamics.

So while TV is catering to the women mainly, films started to become more male dominated. We don't see high budget action or about the struggles men go through on TV. All of this is shown in films. Haven't you noticed that men have more story than women in movies? Why? Because women have more story on TV. Its a matter of balance.

Television in India will die out if they don't get over the saas-bahu storylines, because the audience who mainly watches that stuff is growing older. The younger demographic, who should've been loyal viewers have switched to international TV and web shows.

The examples you gave, shows like Wonder Woman and Charlie's Angels would only do well if released on OTT because its target audience has moved away from television.

There was a time in the 40s and 50s when they'd make ancient historicals like Raja Harishchandra, Veer Ghatotkaj, Hari Darshan, Luv Kush, Lakshmi Narayan etc for the big screen. Once TV emerged, Ramanand Sagar and BR Chopra made Ramayana, Shri Krishna, Mahabharata for the viewers. This actually worked out to be better because there was no need to cut down the content that needed to be shown.

If television in India had followed the same format as it did in the 80s and 90s (once a week) and made better content, we would probably have women-centric films and chick flicks in India too. Unfortunately the damage seems to be too much because television is losing its audience to platforms like Netflix, and to other TV industries like Turkish, South Korean, Pakistani and American.

Originally posted by: harun98

Commercial movie acting depends on what character's actors are playing, how well that character is written and the story, only difference being the movie is commercialised with songs and cinematic liberties. Damini was a commercial movie but actress Minakshi deserved a national award for her performance, Sunny deol won it for his performance which not easy character to act on. This logic that doing art films means you deserve best actor is laughable.

no point telling me this, i believe actor is acting in every film, but for some reason online tells me karishma never act until she started doing serious role for example

Also my crying comments was pointed at kareena, very long time back, someone posted emotional crying scene of kareena and said she can act, and i couldnt differentiate how she was crying before that in other film😆

Originally posted by: atominis

Mother India, Seeta aur Geeta, Chaalbaaz, Khoon Bhari Maang, Jai Santoshi Ma are all blockbusters of their times. Khubsoorat was also a big hit.

And have meatier role for heroines.

None of these were art or offbeat films.

While I understand Mother India or Jai Santoshi Ma concept may not work in today's times, why is Bollywood not making commercial entertainers like Seeta aur Geeta, Khoon bhari maang, Chaalbaaz since 1990s? Remake of Khubsoorat was a disaster but probably more due to casting than the concept itself.

Even films like Gupt or Aitraaz are not made anymore with strong female parallel leads (who are not just vamps).

When entertaining films with heroine dominated concepts have been been and succeeded commercially earlier then why not now?

It is strange that woman oriented films lile Kahani, TDP, TWMR, Queen do become hits but not the biggest hits the way Khoon bhari maang, Seeta Aur Geeta, Chaalbaaz managed to become. Khoon Bhari Maang is biggest surprise given how high it ranked in highest grossing films of year of its release despite being an average film with average music and no hero.

Why can't today's makers make entertainers, potboilers, commercially viable films with heroine dominated concepts with top female stars of the time? I am sure there will be audience for those entertainers (not necessarily niche/offbeat/social message films) if there was audience for female dominated commercial potboilers in 70s and 80s.