Research Focus Group Talk: The Highway, Automobility, and New Promises in 1960s Bombay Cinema

A fascination for color in the 1960s led to Bombay cinema’s mobilization of the hinterland as the site for a new future. With the development of Indian highways and an increase in automobility, a new map of India now occupied the cinematic imagination. This talk will explore the links between the infrastructure of automobile culture, the highway, industrial development outside the city, and 1960s Bombay Cinema.

Ranjani Mazumdar is Professor of Cinema Studies at the School of Arts and Aesthetics, Jawaharlal Nehru University. Her publications focus on urban cultures, popular cinema, gender, and the cinematic city. She is the author of Bombay Cinema: An Archive of the City (2007) and co-author with Nitin Govil of The Indian Film Industry (forthcoming). Her current research focuses on globalization and film culture, the visual culture of film posters, and the intersection of technology, travel, design, and color in 1960s Bombay Cinema.

Sponsored by the Dept. of Film and Media Studies and the IHC’s South Asian Religions and Cultures RFG.