Taking Indian cinema to Hollywood and beyond

India's film giants are investing in Hollywood - let's hope the financial collaboration results in creative crossover

still from Little Box of Sweets
No song-and-dance routines ... scene from Little Box of Sweets

Will Steven Spielberg soon be directing a Bollywood extravanganza? A few years ago this might have seemed like a ridiculous question but with the news that Indian entertainment giant Reliance may invest $500m in Spielberg's DreamWorks studio, it suddenly doesn't sound so unlikely after all. And Spielberg isn't the only major Hollywood player that Reliance are courting, having also recently announced development deals with the production companies of A-listers such as George Clooney, Nicolas Cage, Jim Carrey and Tom Hanks. And Indian co-productions have already made it to the screen, including M Night Shyamalan's The Happening, partly financed by Indian company UTV. So, with this increasing economic power in Hollywood, the question is whether this financial collaboration will result in a creative crossover as well?

For years it seemed like the film industries of the US and India were diverging rather than coming together. Bollywood films have certainly kept pace with all the technical developments, but for all the slick shots and MTV-style glamour they still lack the fundamentals: sophisticated scripts and natural performances. Tigmanshu Dhulia, one of India's up and coming Bollywood directors who is currently filming King Con in the UK, sums it up like this. "In India there's no investment in talent, in story and script development. Bollywood just copies Hollywood films to keep the NRIs [non-resident Indians] happy."

And while NRIs may be more forgiving to muddled scripts and stylised acting, the wider audience is more discerning, especially when it comes to films that fall into the "international cinema" category. These days, we expect more realism, a genuine insight into another culture. This partly explains why films from the far east have proved so popular in the west. Some of these films do, of course, have the advantage of incredible martial arts sequences, but at a deeper level they successfully connect with audiences by showing us a culture that is different but still occupied by archetypes that are recognisable the world over.

Recent Indian blockbusters however are still creating fantasy worlds that fail to reflect what the real India is all about. And, of course they have the inevitable song and dance routines. While my sister and I were trying to finance our film Little Box of Sweets we came under pressure to include some Bollywood-style set pieces and a few shots of random European locations. Although it was encouraging to be offered so much money we wanted to make a story about the real India that we remembered and so financed the film independently in the UK.

Of course, there are other film-makers outside of Bollywood who similarly follow an independent path, including directors such as Mira Nair and Deepa Mehta who have both had success on the world stage with Monsoon Wedding and Water respectively. However, the real way forward would be for the major studios such as Yash Raj, Adlabs and Reliance to take a gamble and invest in good scriptwriters who can write stories which can connect with the audience and in new talented directors that can bring those scripts to the screen. The perfect example of such an investment paying off is Bollywood star Amir Khan's new film Taare Zameen Par, which deals with a boy suffering from dyslexia. It has touched millions of hearts worldwide and was the first Indian film to be bought by Walt Disney for distribution in the US, UK, Canada and Australia. This does indicate that there is a world market for well-made Indian films.

I wouldn't entirely rule out a mainstream Bo-Ho collaboration either. We may not see George Clooney performing a number any time soon but western audiences aren't entirely averse to a bit of singing and dancing. After all, the film musical is just as much a Hollywood tradition as a Bollywood one and the recent success of Mamma Mia! shows it's just as popular as ever. Gurinder Chadha's Bride and Prejudice proved it's possible to bring the Bollywood musical to the west and with the new investment by companies like Reliance the Indian influence is bound to seep through further into Hollywood.

As a film-maker I believe India has a wealth of stories to be told and I look forward to being a part of a new generation of film-makers who take up the challenge of bringing Bollywood to the mainstream. It's an exciting time for Indian cinema and for Hollywood too.