Bhojpuri cinema

Bhojpuri originates in Western Bihar and Eastern Uttar Pradesh in East India. Speakers of it and its creoles are found in many parts of the world, including the United States, the United Kingdom, Fiji, Guyana, Mauritius, South Africa, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago, and Netherlands. During the late 1800s and early 1900s, many colonizers faced labour shortages due to the abolition of slavery; thus, they imported many Indians, many from Bhojpuri-speaking regions, as indentured servants to labor on plantations. Today, millions of people in the Caribbean, Oceania, and North America speak Bhojpuri as a native or second language. ==History==

Initial period (1962–1967) In the 1960s, the first president of India, Rajendra Prasad, who hailed from Bihar, met Bollywood actor Nazir Hussain and asked him to make a film in Bhojpuri, which eventually led to the release of the first Bhojpuri film in 1963. Bhojpuri cinema's history begins with the well-received film Ganga Maiyya Tohe Piyari Chadhaibo ("Mother Ganges, I will offer you a yellow sari"), which was produced by Biswanath Prasad Shahabadi and his partner Jai Narayan Lal under the banner of Nirmal Pictures and directed by Kundan Kumar. The production of the movie was also motivated by a fact that mainstream Hindi cinema seldom depicted the culture and stories of the Purvanchal region (eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar). Decline (1967–1976) In this period, only two Bhojpuri films released, namely Vidhana Naach Nachawe (1968) and Dher Chaalaki Jin Kara (1971). Between, 1977 to 2001, the industry produced about 150 films with an average of 6 films per year. This was quickly followed by several other remarkably successful films, including Panditji Batai Na Biyah Kab Hoi ("Priest, tell me when I will marry", 2005, directed by Mohan Prasad) and Sasura Bada Paisa Wala ("My father-in-law, the rich guy", 2005). In a measure of the Bhojpuri film industry's rise, both of these did much better business in the states of Bihar and Jharkhand than mainstream Bollywood hits at the time. Both films, made on extremely tight budgets, earned back more than ten times their production costs. Sasura Bada Paisa Wala introduced Manoj Tiwari, formerly a well-loved folk singer, to the wider audiences of Bhojpuri cinema. In 2008, he and Ravi Kissan were the leading actors of Bhojpuri films, and their fees increase with their fame. The extremely rapid success of their films has led to dramatic increases in Bhojpuri cinema's visibility, and the industry now supports an awards show and a trade magazine, Bhojpuri City, which chronicles the production and release of what are now over 100 films per year. Post 2001 Many of the major stars of mainstream Bollywood cinema, including Amitabh Bachchan, have recently worked in Bhojpuri films. Mithun Chakraborty's Bhojpuri debut Bhole Shankar, released in 2008, was the biggest and costliest Bhojpuri film at that time. Also in 2008, a 21-minute diploma Bhojpuri film by Siddharth Sinha, Udedh Bun (Unravel) was selected for world premiere at the Berlin International Film Festival. Later it won the National Film Award for Best Short fiction Film. Bhojpuri poet Manoj Bhawuk has written a history of Bhojpuri cinema. In February 2011, a three-day film and cultural festival in Patna marking 50 years of Bhojpuri cinema, opened Ganga Maiyya Tohe Piyari Chadhaibo the first Bhojpuri film. The first Bhojpuri Reality Film "Dhokha" is under production under banner Om Kaushik Films is about to be nominated and screened in different International Film Festivals under direction Of Rashmi Raj Kaushik Vicky and Renu Chaudhary. The industry's modern resurgence from 2001 onwards was driven by significant social and economic shifts. Its commercial success was built upon a new core audience of upwardly mobile lower and middle castes, as well as a large migrant labor population. This shift in audience demographics has been linked to the broader social and political empowerment of these caste groups in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh since the 1990s. == Themes and aesthetics ==

A recurrent theme in modern Bhojpuri movies is the struggle between rural and urban values. This narrative focus echoes with the experiences of its main migrant viewers. In these pictures, the village is frequently portrayed as a source of heroic, humane, and traditional values, while the city is recurrently portrayed as a landscape of greediness, impersonality, and ethical corruption. Bhojpuri cinema's aesthetic is deeply influenced by old folk theater style of the region, such as Nautanki. This influence is apparent in the high number of song anddance sequences, which often surpass that of Bollywood movies, and a filmic style that occasionally employs slower, more static camera work, simulating a theatrical experience for the viewer. Audience and critical reception Bhojpuri cinema is often criticised in the mainstream media for its alleged vulgarity and obscenity. This is often cited as evidence of a cultural divide between the traditional, sophisticated middle classes and the film's mass audience, which is predominantly made up of semi-literate people from lower castes. Members of this demographic often express nostalgia for Bhojpuri films from the 1960s to the 1980s, which were influenced by a different cultural ethos. Despite their reputation for explicit lyrics and suggestive dialogue, an analysis of these films suggests that they depict sexuality and physical exposure more subtly than typical Bollywood cinema. Alongside the mainstream film industry, there is a substantial parallel industry producing low-budget films and albums directly for the CD market. This largely informal sector caters to the same migrant audience and is often considered more bawdy than its big-screen counterpart. == National Film Award winners ==

• Kab Hoi Gavna Hamaar (2005) • Udedh Bun (2008) == Notable people ==

Notable personalities of the Bhojpuri film industry include: Actors Nazir Hussain Actresses Film producers • Neetu Chandra • Rajkumar R. Pandey Film directors • Rajnish Mishra • Santosh Mishra • Rajkumar R. Pandey • Ajay Srivastava • S. N. Tripathi Music directors • Chitragupt (composer) • Damodar Raao Lyricists • Shailendra (lyricist) Singers ==Notable films==

• Ganga Maiyya Tohe Piyari Chadhaibo - First Bhojpuri film, released in 1962 == Notable awards ==