The Otherwoods: Difference between revisions

{{tropeUseful Notes}}

Roughly 1,000 movies are produced in India every year. Of these, around 200 films are produced by [[Bollywood]] each year. Of course, few people outside of India are aware of this, and many foreigners [[Spotlight-Stealing Squad|assume that]] ''[[Spotlight-Stealing Squad|all]]'' [[Spotlight-Stealing Squad|of Indian cinema is Bollywood]]. Contrary to popular opinion, "Bollywood" only refers to [[Indian Languages|Hindi]] films. So where do the other 800 movies come from?

Indeed, whenever South India in general is brought up by North Indians among themselves they will, almost as a [[Verbal Tic]], then say "inna RRRRRAScaleh" (an exaggerated Tamil pronounciationpronunciation of "rascal", referring to the line often famously used by [[Robot (Filmfilm)|South Indian superstar Rajnikanth)]].

These two film industries are today thought of as the [[Large Ham]] of Indian films, [[Up to Eleven|even by Bollywood standards.]] The films are unabashedly escapist. The heroes are always unapologetic [[Marty Stu|Stus]] of the [[God Mode Sue|highest order]]. The [[Love Interest]] (called a "heroine", even if she never does anything heroic) is usually a straight-up [[The Chick|chick]] and [[Distressed Damsel in Distress]]. The action will be over the top and the subtitles will be difficult to understand. Every film will have copious amounts of comic relief as most films attempt to stuff in as much action, romance, and comedy as possible. This all-in-one genre combination is called 'masala'. Even movies with a serious subject matter (politics, horror, history, mythology) more or less follow the same pattern. Also, they are all musicals. ''All of them.'' Combine all of that with the low quality special effects and you get an industry of Narmy, [[So Bad It's Good]] movies. There are exceptions, such as ''I Have Found It'', a Kollywood adaptation of ''[[Sense and Sensibility (Literaturenovel)|Sense and Sensibility]]'', which combines slice-of-life drama, and romance with some mild satire of the South Indian film industries, but these exceptions are relatively few and far between.

What the mainstream of Kollywood and Tollywood have going for them is that they tend to be [[Rated "M" for Manly|more action-oriented than Bollywood and more on the "gritty" side.]] Where Bollywood is lots of romance with token action, South Indian movies are lots of action with [[Token Romance]]. Where Bollywood movies tend to focus on the wealthy, these movies are more likely to feature middle-class and working-class characters (partly because of political influences in the past). Also, they are usually very high-energy. The main reason that the stuey [[Action Hero]] is accepted is because the actors are required to be [[Boisterous Bruiser|entertaining and enthusiastic]] enough to pull off such overbearing roles. There are also pretty high standards set for music and choreography; the two most famous Indian [[Filmi Music|composers]] and the most famous [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sdyC1BrQd6g dancer/choreographer] are actually from Kollywood. Both industries are more experimental than Bollywood: they hire more new talent and are more likely to try new techniques in cinematography and special effects. [[Robot (Filmfilm)|The Tamil film Endhiran]], for instance included robot designs from Stan Winston's studio.

These film industries are also noteworthy for producing lots of politicians, ''à la'' [[Arnold Schwarzenegger|Schwarzenegger]]. The two biggest examples are M.G. Ramachandran (of Kollywood, often shortened to 'MGR') and N.T. Rama Rao (of Tollywood, shortened to 'NTR'). Both formed their own political parties and spun fanatical film [[Fandom|Fandoms]]s into huge voting blocs. Both also pandered to the poor (especially MGR, who was portrayed as a fighter on their behalf in the movies) and to regional pride. Another example is former actress Vijayashanti, who started out portraying stock love interests in Tollywood, bucked the boys-only club by graduating to [[Action Girl|cop heroine roles]] in the nineties, and later went onto a political career. She is the inspiration for a minor character in ''I Have Found It''.

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