ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the development of the subcontinent’s most potent regional movie industry, linking it to the broader historical transformations in late colonial South Asia and beyond. It provides an outline of the main stages of the rising entertainment industry’s development, from the initial experiments with the new medium of film in the 1890s up to the late 1940s, when the coming of independence brought new opportunities and challenges for Indian film-makers. The chapter explores the ambivalent relation of Bombay cinema with both colonialism and nationalism and reconstructs how local cultural influences and transcultural cross-fertilisation shaped its unique character.
