Hall Of Fame: When we live within Cinema | Anjali Chakkoth

As a society yearning for attention, fame on social media is one of the biggest standards by which talent and standard of living is measured. The trend of pre wedding and post wedding videography started since our living rooms saw families come together to watch mesmerising visuals on television. Today, we see our friends spending more money for making a two minute long save-the-date video, travelling from north to south to find a visually beautiful location and find the perfect song to go with their visuals.

The Evolving Landscape of Wedding Videography: From Personal Moments to Social Media Stardom

From a community which made films on a 50k budget, we have travelled forward to an affluent group who is ready to spend lacs of rupees on making a two-three minute long video to share the wedding date with our friends. We have become the kind of people who thrive on the number of “like and comments” on our posts. There are two ways to perceive this social behaviour – as mentioned earlier, it can be that we are conditioned to getting attention that we cannot think of a day without one like or comment for our post, or it can simply be that, we are not getting enough attention. It is definitely not anything like the argument that we are doing it for our own happiness.

The Allure of Likes and Comments: Exploring Society’s Attention-Seeking Behavior on Social Media

We have seen numerous wedding videos (haldi, mehendi, and all sorts of new functions have been included to add to the drama!), where the bride, groom and their families act (sometimes a tad bit too hyper) to film songs, film scenes and so on. Is this attention-seeking or is it that intense desire to see ourselves on a screen? The new applications like Tiktok, Dubsmash, Smule are all products designed for a community who were shocked to see a train rushing towards them in the movie, and ran for their lives. Cinema has always touched our lives and is like our second skin now. We love the big white screen and sits wide eyed in a moment of trance, like the child seeing magic for the first time.

Cinema’s Underbelly: Navigating the Challenges Faced by Emerging Filmmakers in the Modern Era

Everything about this world of cinema is beautiful from the side we are on, safely away from the hot mess it actually is. The underbelly of cinema is made up of the dreams of many young writers and talents artistes who have already spent years to be even a very negligible part of this industry. We have seen youngsters who can make films for a budget of 20k, but not able to find a producer to invest that money. On the other side is such wedding videography, where we spent lacs and crores only for the sake of a few likes and comments. There is a dire need for change in our attitude, from investing in fame, to investing in hard work and talent.

From Box Office to Cult Status: Rethinking Film Appreciation in the Age of Instant Gratification

When we observe the quality of films being made today, we realise that there is a grave shortage of writers, and great stories. It is said that life experiences make an artist complete and we are forced to believe so. In this era where filmmaking is carried forward like the legacy of the superstar family, where the superstar’s son keeps getting films despite his inability to perform anything at all and where the undercurrents of casteism becomes the scale to measure talent, we should be thankful to those few whose art is sheer magic. We should be ready to accept great art, despite its meagre origins.

There have been great films which went unrecognised and sometimes degraded when it first got released and later was taken into the “cult” status after its release on Hotstar or Torrent. This tendency should be avoided. Instead of praising a film after we make it a flop at the box office, we should promote watching it in theatres. Video piracy is a punishable offence, but we are a generation who has instant lives and continues to find cheapest routes to fame.