Parallel cinema
The movement was initially led by Bengali cinema and produced internationally acclaimed filmmakers such as Satyajit Ray, Mrinal Sen, Ritwik Ghatak, Tapan Sinha and others.
It is known for its serious content, realism and naturalism, symbolic elements with a keen eye on the sociopolitical climate of the times, and the general rejection of inserted song-and-dance routines that are typical of mainstream Indian films.
One of the earliest examples was Baburao Painter's 1925 silent film classic Savkari Pash (Indian Shylock), about a poor peasant (portrayed by V. Shantaram) who "loses his land to a greedy moneylender and is forced to migrate to the city to become a mill worker.
[3] The Parallel Cinema movement began to take shape from the late 1940s, by pioneers such as Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak, Bimal Roy, Mrinal Sen, Tapan Sinha, Khwaja Ahmad Abbas, Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Chetan Anand, Guru Dutt and V. Shantaram.
The most famous Indian "neo-realist" was the Bengali film director Satyajit Ray, followed by Shyam Benegal, Mrinal Sen, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, G. Aravindan and Girish Kasaravalli.
[18] Renowned Filmmaker Basu Chatterjee also built his plots on middle-class lives and directed films like Piya Ka Ghar, Rajnigandha and Ek Ruka Hua Faisla.
[19] Another filmmaker to integrate art and commercial cinema was Guru Dutt, whose film Pyaasa (1957) featured in Time magazine's "All-TIME" 100 best movies list.
[24] The protagonist of Ajantrik, Bimal, can also be seen as an influence on the cynical cab driver Narasingh (played by Soumitra Chatterjee) in Satyajit Ray's Abhijan (1962).
The movement gained significant momentum in the 1970s and 1980s resulting in numerous national awards and international recognition to Kannada cinema.
Based on the novel by Sane Guruji, the film explored a boy named Shyam shares a deep bond with his mother, who has had a significant influence on his life and upbringing.
The Marathi parallel cinema movement truly gained momentum in the 1970s and 1980s, due to filmmakers like Vijay Tendulkar, Jabbar Patel and Rajdutt.
This era produced films that focused on social realism, shedding light on the struggles of the marginalized, rural life, and complex human relationships.
This era of Marathi cinema also laid the foundation for later filmmakers to experiment with different forms and explore the nuances of human emotion, regional culture, and societal issues.
Mani Kaul's first several films Uski Roti (1971), Ashadh Ka Ek Din (1972), Duvidha (1974), and were critically appreciated and held to high esteem in the international spotlight.
Benegal's directorial debut, Ankur (Seeding, 1974) was a major critical success, and was followed by numerous works that created another field in the movement.
Kumar Shahani, a student of Ritwik Ghatak, released his first feature Maya Darpan (1972) which became a landmark film of Indian art cinema.
Some of the most acclaimed Indian filmmakers at the time were from the Malayalam industry, including Adoor Gopalakrishnan, K. P. Kumaran, G. Aravindan, John Abraham, Padmarajan, Bharathan, T. V. Chandran and Shaji N.
Some of the other notable filmmakers of this period were P. Lankesh, G. V. Iyer, M. S. Sathyu who were later followed by T. S. Nagabharana, Baraguru Ramachandrappa, Shankar Nag, Chandrashekhara Kambara in the 1980s.
With an absence of an alternative exhibition system or an art house circuit as it is called in the west, many of the off beat films made by present generation film makers like Sushant Mishra, Himanshu Khatua, Ashish Avikunthak, Murali Nair, Amitabh Chakraborty, Paresh Kamdar, Priya Krishnaswamy, Vipin Vijay, Ramchandra PN, Ashwini Mallik, Anand Subramanian, Sanjivan Lal, Amit Dutta, Umesh Vinayak Kulkarni, Gurvinder Singh, and Bela Negi have never had a large audience.
Other modern examples of art films produced in India which are classified as part of the parallel cinema genre include Rituparno Ghosh's Utsab (2000) and Dahan (1997), Tarun Majumdar's Alo (2003), Mani Ratnam's Yuva (2004), Nagesh Kukunoor's 3 Deewarein (2003) and Dor (2006), Manish Jha's Matrubhoomi (2004), Sudhir Mishra's Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi (2005), Jahnu Barua's Maine Gandhi Ko Nahin Mara (2005), Pan Nalin's Valley of Flowers (2006), Onir's My Brother… Nikhil (2005) and Bas Ek Pal (2006), Anurag Kashyap's Black Friday (2007), Vikramaditya Motwane's Udaan (2009), Kiran Rao's Dhobi Ghat (2010), Amit Dutta's Sonchidi (2011), and Anand Gandhi's Ship of Theseus (2013).
Independent films spoken in Indian English include Revathi's Mitr, My Friend (2002), Aparna Sen's Mr. and Mrs. Iyer (2002) and 15 Park Avenue (2006), Homi Adajania's Being Cyrus (2006), Rituparno Ghosh's The Last Lear (2007), and Sooni Taraporevala's Little Zizou (2009).
Some of the Indian art film directors active today include Buddhadeb Dasgupta, Aparna Sen, Gautam Ghose, Sandip Ray (Satyajit Ray's son), Kaushik Ganguly, Suman Mukhopadhyay, Kamaleshwar Mukherjee and Soukarya Ghosal in Bengali cinema; Adoor Gopalakrishnan, Shaji N. Karun, T. V. Chandran, M.P.
He has helped introduce parallel cinema to mainstream audiences, with his films earning both commercial success and critical acclaim in India and overseas.
[45] The "youthful coming-of-age dramas that have flooded art houses since the mid-fifties owe a tremendous debt to the Apu trilogy" (1955–1959).
[47] Ray's 1967 script for a film to be called The Alien, which was eventually cancelled, is widely believed to have been the inspiration for Steven Spielberg's ET (1982).
A number of Satyajit Ray films appeared in the Sight & Sound Critics' Poll, including The Apu Trilogy (ranked No.
