Review of book on 1980s Hindi cinema | Those were the days | ASH NEWS

Avijit Ghosh’s ode to 1980s Hindi cinema reassesses an unfairly maligned decade that was more dynamic than we realise

‘When Ardh Satya Met Himmatwala: The Many Lives of 1980s’ Bombay Cinema’ by Avijit Ghosh | SPEAKING TIGER | Rs 599 | 392 pages

Movie buffs of a certain vintage, this reviewer included, have often decried the 1980s as the unquestioned nadir for Hindi cinema. The only redeeming thing about that decade, we have declared, were the ‘art’ or ‘parallel’ films made by directors like Shyam Benegal, Govind Nihalani and Ketan Mehta—even if those were sometimes just as trite as the commercial films (and even if the parallel star-system headlined by Shabana Azmi and Naseeruddin Shah, Om Puri and Smita Patil, could be as much of a closed echo-chamber as the mainstream star system). However, there comes a point in the life of any serious cineaste when one can look back on even disreputable decades through a lens that combines nostalgia with serious analysis, allowing us to recognise the good things amidst the dreck, and the many ways in which our lives were transformed by both. With that in mind, Avijit Ghosh’s affectionate revisiting of the 1980s is a good addition to our popular-film literature.