South Asian cinema

South Asian cinema refers to the cinema of Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The terms Asian cinema, Eastern cinema and Oriental cinema in common usage often encompass South Asia as well as East Asia and South East Asia. See also Asian cinema, East Asian cinema and Southeast Asian cinema.

The scope of South Asian cinema is huge and takes in a wide array of different film styles, linguistic regions and genres. South Asian cinema is particularly famous in the West for:

India contains many state languages which have film industries centered on them. Although Hindi is the official language of government business of northern regions of India, its often-used dialect Hindustani is the most widespread language but covering only 40% of the total population, and English is widely understood irrespective of region, the state languages are preserved for official use by different states in India, and many have as many speakers as an average European nation. Regional industries have also tended to produce a higher percentage of serious art film and political film. Bangladeshi cinema is filmed in Bengali and Sri Lankan cinema is filmed in Sinhala and Tamil. Last but not least is Indonesian cinema. In the beginning the Indonesian cinema grew after World War I, rooted from the Folk Theater Drama called Dardanela. Under Usmar Ismail, Indonesian cinema became the new entertainment in 1950 to 1980. Hundred of film stars were born, such as: Citra Dewi (1960), Tanty Yosepha (1970). Yenny Rachman and Christine Hakim (1980) and Dian Sastro (late 1990s). Teguh Karya was one of the leading Film Director in Indonesia after the era of Usmar Ismail. Now, by the popularity of television, film is replaced with electronic cinema which is popular as sinetron. This industry has made the Indian born producer, Raam Punjabi, a tycon of sinetron in Indonesia.

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