Communication Cinema Development : Morosity to Hope

After over forty years of development, on the eve of the year 2000, there are more jobless, poor, sick, and homeless than ever before. These are the facts, indeed the people, that confront us. We must see the limitations of development and create new, much more radical projects.

Communication departments, with cinema studies are being increas-ingly established in India. This book was written especially for the students of these departments. The book has three interrelated parts. Parts One and Two probe various aspects of communication and cinema, respectively, in the context of so-called development. Part Three exemplifies the arguments of Parts One and Two through analysis of films like the Heart Trilogy of Satyajit Ray, Ganasatru, Shakhaproshaka and Agantuk, two films from Bangladesh, Jesus ’71, Beder Meye Josna, and City of Joy. Cinema plays a vital role in the life of our people. Indian movie stars shine both on the silver screen and in golden politics, and the Indian masses enter the films they watch to step out the other side of the screen into their reality, programmed, as it were, by the dreams which the films gave them. There is need for a serious reflection on the link between communication, cinema and development. Development is seen in this book as an international project that has little to offer to those most in need.