Fantasies of a Bollywood Love Thief
Though I picked up a mountain of books in Bombay and Madras last month, I’m holding them for the moment and returning to Stephen Alter’s Fantasies of a Bollywood Love Thief: Inside the World of Indian Moviemaking. I had just started it in November and left it home when I headed overseas.
It’s primarily a making-of account of Vishal Bhardwaj’s Shakespearean hit Omkara, but it opens with an overview of the film industry and some history, and it promises to be both a fun and informative read.
More later…
February 1st, 2008 at 1:33 pm
I must check out this book.
February 1st, 2008 at 7:28 pm
The author is actually a cousin of Tom alter. Check out his other interesting work “Elephas Maximus - A Portrait of the Indian Elephant” .
February 11th, 2008 at 7:53 pm
Hey this one sounds interesting. But I doubt if I get the copy in my town (Mangalore).
February 14th, 2008 at 6:27 am
Nic, indeed, and he makes mention of that in the start of the book.
Astroshiva, I think I saw it in bookstores in Madras and/or Bombay, so I’d think you should have it by you also….
May 20th, 2008 at 7:44 am
I read your comment about this book a while ago and checked it out in my local library - the book is very interesting and certainly worth reading. Loved the behind-the-scenes information and all the film-related trivia. Thanks for alerting me to it!
May 20th, 2008 at 12:24 pm
Hi BV, great, glad you found it and liked it!
I was interviewing Vijay Acharya this weekend and I mentioned to him that a similar book about the making of Tashan would have been an interesting travelogue companion to Alter’s Omkara book, especially given how much of Tashan was filmed on several locations (versus Omkara where they built a village off-site and hunkered down there for most of the shooting), but, given how the film has not been received very well, the appetite for such a book is limited to those die-hards - like yours truly - who loves all that “making-of” back story.