Hindi film industry is one of the most prominent film industries in the world. Based in Mumbai, Indian film industry is also known as bollywood. The origin of the word, bollywood comes from the combination of Bombay and Hollywood. If we take the number of movies released in India, then Indian film industry boasts of being one of the giants of world cinema. Movies were first introduced in India in the year 1896 courtesy France’s Lumiere Brothers’. They had launched six soundless short films and that caught the fancy of entertainment hungry Indian public.
Indian film industry took a giant leap in 1913 when legendary Dada Saheb Phalke released movie ‘Raja Harishchandra’. It was the first indigenous Indian movie. It was also a silent movie. For next two decades, all the released movies were silent. But the tide turned with release of movie ‘Alam Ara’ which was the first speaking movie of India. Since then it has been an eventful journey for Indian cinema. Soon enough, bollywood movie started to have song and dance sequences. The concept of playback singing also took place in 1940s. Before that, actors used to sing their own songs. Playback singing was made popular by numero uno K L Sehgal. Then, one after another new singers kept coming and gave us wonderful songs that are still cherished.
Indian cinema turned another leaf with the advent of colours in cinema. What it did was enhancing the popularity of films. It also gave a new meaning to Indian dresses which could now be seen in colourful avatars in an aesthetic fashion. Colours brought more crowds to the theatres. Arrival of colours coincided with flourishing romantic cinemas of 1950s and 60s. That is said to be the best phase of Indian cinema with many blockbusters.