The 1980s. In Hindi cinema, it was the decade of the dark and powerful police
drama Ardh Satya. It was the decade of the kitschy excess of the action comedy
Himmatwala. It was a decade of opposites.
It was a time when the best of NewWave 2.0 won acclaim and awards across the
globe, and B-grade'sex films' drew crowds into rundown small-town theatres;
when ridiculous lyrics set to'disco music' created massive chartbusters, and the
poetry of Kabir, Tulsidas and Faiz also found space in film songs.
It was a time when Amitabh Bachchan's injury had all of India praying for a
miracle; when Peter Pan Jeetendra was spending more time shooting in Madras
than in Bombay; when Rekha still ruled but Sridevi was rising to superstardom;
when Naseer, Shabana, Om and Smita were the Fab Four of arthouse cinema;
when the flamboyant dancing stars Mithun and Govinda brought a whole new
aesthetic to Bollywood; when North and South met and mated like never before.
It was a time of furious change beyond the silver screen, too: video cassettes
brought cinema to drawing rooms and bedrooms; television and one-day cricket
emerged as fierce competition to films; piracy put movie theatres in crisis; film
stars were elected to the Indian Parliament in surprising numbers.
In this thoroughly researched and entertaining book, Avijit Ghosh, author of the
acclaimed bestsellers Cinema Bhojpuri and 40 Retakes, narrates the fascinating story of
perhaps the most eventful, disruptive and transformative decade of Hindi cinema.
