Figurations in Indian Film

Adrian Martin has called the idea of the figure “simultaneously a very simple and a very complex business, natural and easy as well as contrived and theatrical.” This formulation is especially true of Indian cinema where the very question of figuration is informed by an array of conflicting energies and ideologies. More than a body, character, or even prototype, the figure is often several of these things at once.

The figures that exhibit maximum tenacity in Indian cinema often emerge in the interface of recognizable binaries—self/other, Indian/foreign, good/bad, virtue/vice, myth/reality, urban/rural, and so on. Indian cinema’s vexed relationship to modernity provides an important point of entry into the question of figuration. Realism’s limited traction in much of Indian cinema is critical to understanding its propensity towards the figurative over the strictly representational.

The authors in this volume approach Indian cinema from multiple perspectives, ranging from investigations of the political and the generic, to unraveling the figurative resonances of fabrics, stars, and icons, in an era of media convergence. Figurations in Indian Film demonstrates that the conversation about the relationship between bodies, modernity, globalization, aesthetics and politics is far from settled and suggests some exciting new ways of theorizing the same.

This book would appeal to any reader interested in Indian cinema, culture and politics.