Indian stars will attend Cannes – but won’t be centre stage, reveals bhaskar gautam |
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The Indian actress Aishwarya Rai has visited the Cannes film festival in various roles in the past - as a juror, as the face of L'Oreal, and as the glamorous heroine of Devdas in a special screening in 2002.
This year, Rai (right) comes as a new addition to the powerful Bachchan family, following her marriage last month to Abhishek Bachchan, son of the mighty Amitabh. The Bollywood brigade will also include the actor Hrithik Roshan and supermodel Bipasha Basu.
Sadly, however, India's presence at Cannes will be confined to glamour. A plan to combine celebrations for the 60th festival with India's six decades of independence collapsed when the festival found nothing suitable for competition. India has to be content with the screening of seven movies in a sidebar event, Cinema of the World.
Despite the fact that India makes more |
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| The last time India competed at Cannes most of the audience walked out |
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movies than Hollywood - three a day are produced - the country's cinema is not universal. Nuances and mannerisms prove frighteningly foreign to non-Indian audiences.
The last time India competed at Cannes was in 1994 when most of the audience walked out of Kerala director Shaji Karun's Swaham. Not because the film was bad, but because its idiom and language were too alien.
Since then there have been one or two Bollywood films shown out of competition, but with little success. Devdas exasperated viewers with its length, and was ripped apart by Cannes critics, though Aishwarya Rai proved to be the darling of the Riviera crowds and parties.
Rai's fans will at least be able to see her latest two films at the festival
market: Jodhaa Akbar, in which she plays the 16th-century Hindu Queen of India's Mughal King Akbar, and Guru, where she's the wife of a wealthy industrialist.
FIRST POSTED MAY 16, 2007 |
