The Indian film industry is the largest in the world in terms of ticket sales.....

Cinema of India

The Indian film industry is the largest in the world in terms of ticket sales and number of films produced annually (877 feature films and 1177 short films were released in the year 2003 alone).
Movie tickets in India are among the cheapest in the world.
India accounts for 73% of movie admissions in the Asia-Pacific region, and earnings are currently estimated at US$8.9 billion.
32,292,28,80,000
thirty two thousand two hundred and ninety two crores twenty eight lakhs and eighty thousand rupees.

The industry is mainly supported by the vast cinema-going Indian public. The Central Board of Film Certification of India cites on its website that every three months an audience as large as India's billion-strong population visits cinema halls.
Indian films are popular in various parts of the world, especially in countries with significant Indian communities.

THE INTRODUCTION OF CINEMA IN INDIA

A choronology of indian cinema (1896 -1905)
1896
First ever Motion picture Screening in India at Watson's Hotel, Bombay on July 7
1897
First films shown in Calcutta and Madras. Clifton and Co. announce daily screenings at their Meadows Street Photography Studio, Bombay.
1898
Two Italians, Colorello and Cornaglia, organize film shows in tents at the Azad Maidan Bombay.
1899
H.S. Bhatavdekar (Save Dada) films a wrestling match in Hanging Gardens, Bombay - the first Indian Documentary.
1900
Major Warwick establishes a cinema in Madras.

1901
Hiralal Sen's Royal Bioscope establishes Film Exhibition alongside the Commercial Theatre in Calcutta, filming extracts from plays.
1902
J.F. Madan acquires equipment from Pathe and launches his bioscope show in a tent on Calcutta's Maidan.
1903
Save Dada and American Biograph film Lord Curzon's Delhi Darbar
1904
Manek D. Sethna starts the Touring Cinema Co. in Bombay showing The Life of Christ, a two-reeler.
1905
J.F. Madan turns producer with Jyotish Sarkar's film of a protest rally against partition of Bengal. Swamikannu Vincent, a draughtsman for the railways, acquires a projector and film from a visiting Frenchman and sets up a touring cinema going around small towns and villages in the South of India.

J.F. Madan was another highly successful film producer, who released hit films like Satyavadi Raja Harishchandra ; also, he launched Madan Theatres Limited, which became India's largest film production-distribution-exhibition company and the biggest importer of American films after World War I.

Cinema houses were set up in major Indian cities in this period, like one in Madras (in 1900 by Major Warrick), the Novelty Cinema in Bombay (where newsreels from the Boer Wars were shown) and the Elphinstone Picture Palace in Calcutta (set up by J.F. Madan in 1907).

REGIONAL FILM INDUSTRIES

The Tamil film industry

The Tamil film industry, based in the Kodambakkam area of Chennai is one among the biggest film industries in India.
Tamil films have enjoyed consistent popularity among Tamil speakers in India, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Malaysia and Mauritius.
Tamil films also receive fame in countries which contain Tamil immigrant communities such as the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, and other European countries.
Kollywood remains second after Bollywood in India commercially and financially. Several technicians have crossed industries to encapture National fame such as Mani Ratnam, Selvaraghavan, A. R. Rahman, Shankar, Ravi K. Chandran and Jeeva. However unlike the technical counterparts, artistes from South India tend to fail to break into Bollywood, with only a handful breaking through, them being: Kamal Haasan, Sridevi, Madhavan, Siddharth Narayan and Asin Thottumkal.
Alaipayuthey (2000), mastered both the qualities of commercial and critical cinema.
Ironically, several Bollywood actresses made their débuts in Kollywood, with Aishwarya Rai appearing in Iruvar, Priyanka Chopra in Thamizhan, Lara Dutta in Arasatchi and Sushmita Sen in Ratchagan. Furthermore, several actresses have done Tamil films while struggling to breakthrough in Bollywood, such as Kajol and her sister, Tanisha as well as Amisha Patel.
In the Tamil film industry, directors such as K. Balachander, Shankar, Bala, Bharathiraja, Balu Mahendra, and Mani Ratnam have achieved box-office success whilst producing films that have balanced art and popular elements.
The Tamil film industry accounts for approximately 1% of the gross domestic product of the state of Tamil Nadu.

COSTS OF PRODUCTION

have grown exponentially from just under Rs.4 million in 1980 to over Rs.110 million by 2005 for a typical star-studded big-budget film.
Similarly, costs of processing per print have risen from just under Rs.2,500 in 1980 to nearly Rs.70,000 by 2005.
There has been a growing presence of English in dialogue and songs as well. It is not uncommon to see movies that feature dialogue studded with English words and phrases, or even whole sentences. Some movies are also simultaneously released in two or three regional languages (either using subtitles or several soundtracks).
Contemporary Tamil movies often feature Madras Bashai, a colloquial version of Tamil spoken in Madras. A select few, Iruvar and older films based on epics, for instance, employ literary Tamil extensively in dialogues when the situation calls for it. Many Tamil films are also dubbed into Telugu and Hindi and released in their respective states.