South Indian Cinema

Abstract

Cinema scholars often refer to Hindi cinema as Indian cinema. India has diverse languages, cultures, and a long history of Cinema of its own. Regional cinema in numbers, as well as quality, competes with any cinema in the world. The study is an attempt to present the case of five film industries in the southern part of India, which includes Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, and Tulu language films. The southern film industries is theorized as 'South Indian cinema' as they share similar features, yet each one of them is unique. South Indian cinema has often been looked down upon as it is cheap and vulgar. The research also explores the gender dimensions in both the industry as well as on-screen presentation. This chapter aims to provide a theoretical and philosophical interpretation of South Indian cinema.