Page 34 - Seniorstoday May 2023 Issue
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Phalke’s Raja Harishchandra (1913) is the film production centre too, with Dalsukh
first Indian feature film, but a year before M. Pancholi as the pioneer, whose Pancholi
that Dadasaheb Torne’s Shree Pundalik Art Pics was the largest film studio in
was released. It was just a recording of a Lahore.
stage play, so not really counted as a feature
film.
According to information available on
the net, Torne was the first Indian to open
a movie distribution company. In 1929, he
started Famous Pictures with his colleague
Baburao Pai. He was the one who advised
Ardeshir Irani to set up his own studio
(Jyoti Studio, that is now just a board
on a property full of motor garages) and The first chain of Indian cinemas, Madan
film production companies, Imperial and Theatres was established by Jamshedji
Sagar. It is recorded in cinema history that Framji Madan, who was also behind the
Ardeshir Irani made the first Indian talkie, production and distribution of several early
Alam Ara (1931). After a long and successful films.
career, Torne died in obscurity and Irani, In Mumbai, there was the legendary
who combined creative talent with business Bombay Talkies, set up by Devika Rani
acumen, surely needs to be remembered and Himansu Rai in 1934, but there were
too, even if very few bits of Alam Ara others gaining ground in those heady
remain. days of cinema. Calcutta’s (Now Kolkata)
While Bombay (now New Theatres founded in 1931 under the
Mumbai) was the leadership of BN Sircar and between the
incubator of Indian two behemoths, they had captured the best
cinema, films were being writing, directing, music and acting talent,
made in Bengali, Tamil, going on to make some of the biggest hits
Telugu, Malayalam, of the era. A decade later, after the death of
Assamese and Punjabi, Himansu Rai, Sashadhar Mukherjee, Rai
soon after Raja Bahadur Chunilal, Ashok Kumar and Gyan
Harishchandra. The first Mukherjee left Bombay Talkies and set up
Tamil film was Keechaka Vadham (1917) by Filmistan, continuing their winning streak.
R. Nataraja Mudaliar, the first Malayalam (The derelict Bombay Talkies property
film, Vigathakumaram (1928) was made still stands in Malad, a Mumbai suburb,
by JC Daniel Nadar; the first Telugu film Filmistan in the nearby suburb of Goregaon
was Savitri (1933) directed by C. Pullaiah. has survived in much better shape.)
Jyoti Prasad Agarwala made Joymoti In 1929, Prabhat Films had been formed,
(1935), the first Assamese film. The first first in Kolhapur and then shifted to Pune
film studio in South India, Durga Cinetone, in 1933 where a sprawling studio was built
was built in 1936 by Nidamarthi Surayya in (where the Film & Television Institute of
Rajahmundry, Andhra Pradesh. India now stands) by V. Shantaram, VG
Before Partition, Lahore used to be a major Damle, Keshav Rao Dhaibar, S. Fatehlal and
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