2. a Superhit Goddess

Ganesh, lord of auspicious beginnings and father of goddess Santoshi Ma. A Superhit Goddess Jai Santoshi Maa and Caste Hierarchy in Indian Films Part One Philip Lutgendorf “Audiences were showering coins, perennials of its vast output, yet they quarter of national cinematic output) flower petals and rice at the screen constitute one of the least-studied enjoys the largest audience in appreciation of the film. They aspects of this comparatively under- throughout the Indian subcontinent entered the cinema barefoot and set studied cinema. Indeed, I will venture and beyond. Sholay (“Flames”) and up a small temple outside…. In that for scholars and critics, Deewar (“The Wall”), were both Bandra, where mythological films mythologicals have generally been heavily-promoted “multi-starrers” aren’t shown, it ran for fifty weeks. It “hard to see.” Yet DeMille’s words belonging to the then-dominant genre was a miracle”. —Anita Guha, also belie the fact that most sometimes referred to as the masala (actress who played goddess mythologicals—like most commercial (“spicy”) film: a multi-course cinematic Santoshi Ma; cited in Kabir films of any genre—flop at the box banquet incorporating suspenseful office. The comparatively few that drama, romance, comedy, violent 2001:115). have enjoyed remarkable and action sequences, and song and Genre, Film & Phenomenon sustained acclaim hence merit study dance. Both were expensive and Cecil B. DeMille’s famously both as religious expressions and as slickly made by the standards of the cynical adage, “God is box office,” successful examples of popular art and industry, and both featured Amitabh may be applied to Indian popular entertainment. Bachchan, the male superstar whose cinema, the output of the world’s Of the four hundred and seventy- iconic portrayal of an “angry young largest film industry, albeit with five Indian films released in 1975, three man” would dominate the Hindi screen certain adjustments—one must enjoyed enormous success. All were for the next decade. Female characters pluralise and sometimes feminise its in Hindi, the lingua franca of the were marginal to both, and this was subject. The genres known as entertainment industry based in not surprising given that their target “mythologicals” and “devotionals” Bombay (a.k.a. Mumbai), lately audience was young urban males, who were present at the creation of the dubbed “Bollywood,” which strongly identified with their themes Indian film and have remained hardy (although it generates less than a of honor and revenge. 10 MANUSHI Superhit Goddess his 50-minute feature Raja The third “superhit” of 1975 could Harishchandra—the bulk of films hardly have been more different, shown on Indian screens continued to however, and came as a complete be foreign, with American output surprise to both the industry and the dominating, a situation that prevailed press. Jai Santoshi Maa (“Hail to the until well into the sound era of the Mother of Satisfaction”)1 was a low- 1930s.2 Both nationalism and religious budget film featuring unknown feeling inflect Phalke’s oft-quoted actors, cheap sets and crude special account of his 1911 viewing of a film effects, and a plot and audience called The Life of Christ, which caused dominated by women. Dedicated to omission) by scholars, as well as the him to mentally visualise “the Gods, a little-known Hindu goddess, it responses, from several disciplinary Shri Krishna, Shri Ramchandra,” and to belonged to a film genre that had perspectives, to the Santoshi Ma ponder the question, “Could we, the been considered marginal for more film and phenomenon. sons of India, ever be able to see Indian than three decades. Yet Jai Santoshi Early Mythologicals images on the screen?” (Rajadhyaksha Maa became a runaway, word-of- The chronology of early cinema in 1993:49). Phalke’s 1913 effort, based on mouth hit, packing cinemas in major India closely paralleled its development an episode in the Mahabharata, was urban centers and smaller provincial in the West, from the first demonstration the first of nearly a hundred films he towns. It also became something of the Lumière brothers’ cinématograph would make over the next two decades, more: a phenomenon that gave a new in Bombay in July of 1896, only six almost all based on epic and (puranic) and specifically Indian inflection to months after its unveiling in Europe. tales. These included Lanka Dahan the American pop phrase “cult film,” Both in its technology and content, (“The Burning of Lanka,” 1917), for audiences commonly engaged in early cinema carried the cachet (or depicting the monkey Hanuman’s ritual and devotional behavior during stigma) of being a foreign innovation, exploits in the Ramayana and said to its screenings, and temples and and was largely confined to the new have been “India’s first big box-office shrines to its titular goddess soon commercial cities of the British Raj, hit” (Rangoonwalla 1983:33), and Shri began to appear in many parts of where it was patronised by European Krishna Janma (“The Birth of Lord India. As the years passed, the film residents and the Anglophone elite. Krishna,” 1918). The appearance of the acquired the status of a “cult Even after Indian producers became divine incarnations Rama and Krishna classic,” and was regularly revived, active—this is generally dated to May in the latter two films is said to have especially for women’s matinees on of 1913, when D. G. Phalke released elicited a powerful response from Friday, the day associated with the vrat or ritual fast and worship of Santoshi Ma; by all accounts, hundreds of thousands and perhaps millions of women periodically participated in such worship. Media accounts of the sudden emergence of a modern “celluloid goddess” attracted the interest of scholars interested in the impact of film on religion and popular culture, and as a result Jai Santoshi Maa became unique among mythological films by becoming the subject of a modest scholarly literature. To establish a context for my own examination of the film, I will briefly survey the history of mythologicals and their Babubhai Mistri’s 1965 Mahabharat, Krishna displays his cosmic form to Arjuna in a scene recapitulating conventions of popular poster art. evaluation (or more typically, No.131 11 viewers, as “…men and women in New Competing Genres numbers (e.g., the Telugu language the audience prostrated themselves Mythological/devotional films cinema of Andhra Pradesh; Shah before the screen” (Barnouw accounted for all but one of the 1950:120-122). In the dominant and Krishnaswamy 1980:15). twenty-five feature films made by Hindi language cinema, according Significantly, Phalke seems to have Indian producers prior to 1920 to Nasreen Munni Kabir, the catered to—indeed, helped to (Rangoonwalla 1983:35), but mythological “had virtually create—a different audience than cinematic content changed rapidly disappeared by the 1950s” (Kabir that which patronised foreign films. in the next decade. Dhiren Ganguli’s 2001:114)—a fact that would make the He advertised in vernacular Bilat Ferat (“England Returned,” success of Jai Santoshi Maa more newspapers rather than in the 1921), offered a contemporary striking. English-language press, and took comedy of manners, and Madan Absence of Scholarly Study his shows to the hinterland, often by Theatres’ Barer Bazar (“Marriage There exists no major scholarly bullock cart, to offer inexpensive Market,” 1922) dramatised a social study of the mythological film genre, screenings to rural audiences who problem (ibid. 40-49). There were and only a handful of articles devoted sat on the ground before makeshift historical dramas like Simgadh (“The to it. This is surprising, since screens (ibid.). Fortress of Simgadh,” 1923), on the mythologicals constituted the most Other producers followed Phalke’s life of the Maratha king Shivaji, and distinctive early product of Indian example. The Elphinstone Bioscope thrillers like Kala Naag (“Black cinema, one that “earmarked for Company of Calcutta issued its own Cobra,” 1924), based on a sensational the Indian film an area of subject version of the Harishchandra story, murder case in Bombay (ibid. matter that won for it an immediate nearly double the length of Phalke’s, 49-50; Rajadhyaksha and Willemen and powerful hold in India in 1917, and later that year offered 1995:227). The variety of nascent and neighbouring countries….” Prahlad Charitra (“The Deeds of genres suggested by these titles (Barnouw and Krishnaswamy Prahlad”), based on the Bhagavata reflects the pressure of competition 1980:20). Moreover, these films were Purana story of a legendary devotee within a growing industry (by 1930, instrumental in “laying down the of Vishnu (Rangoonwalla 1983:33). India was producing close to 200 films operative norms of Indian films, The first film made in south India was per year), which caused filmmakers to both in form and content, which are 1919’s Keechaka Vadham (“The seek new sources of appealing still in use after seventy years” Slaying of Keechaka”), likewise narrative. Mythologicals continued to (Rangoonwalla 1983:31). Yet beyond adapted from the Mahabharata. Such be produced (and re-produced: e.g., the Phalke era (to which the two films, which themselves celebrated the Mahabharata tale of Savitri had preceding quotes refer), standard swadeshi or indigenous manu- been filmed at least eight times by surveys of Indian cinema make, at facture, embodied a nationalist 1937; Barnouw and Krishhnaswamy most, only scattered reference to message through traditional tales 1980:100), but they comprised a mythologicals (e.g., Barnouw and presented via a fascinating new shrinking percentage of output. Krishnaswamy 1980:90-91, 100-101, technology; they helped to draw According to B. V. Dharap, they 173; Chakravarty 1993:2, 35-36, 42), new constituencies into the cinema, accounted for roughly seventy per and the most theoretically ambitious and into a project of Indian cent of films made prior to 1923, but recent study of popular cinema, modernity.

Load more