Many Indians admit they do. Bollywood was dominated for years by musicals in which scenes of bees’ sucking honey from flowers were as erotic as it got. Since the mid-’ 90s, some filmmakers have been getting racier to avoid the fate of 75 percent of Indian movies, which is to lose money. Now, there are signs the margin is becoming the majority; so far this year, nearly two thirds of new Indian films have received an “A” rating for adult content. While these so-called sex flicks still stop short of full nudity, they do show just about anything that can be done with clothes on, from kissing on the mouth to simulated copulation.
A leader of the taboo-bending school is Mahesh Bhatt, who made “Murder” with Sherawat and another recent hit, “Jism” (“Body”), with Bipasha Basu. Basu had crowds cheering, and “Body” quickly doubled its $1 million cost. That’s big box office in a nation where tickets cost $3 at most. “I believe I am here to titillate,” says Bhatt. “We Indians do everything but never talk about it, never show it in our movies. That had to stop.”
Sex saves, too. Top Hindi stars are men who can make more than $1 million a movie, and Bhatt says he can make two films for that price. Starlets “will cost less, be bolder and throw less tantrums,” he says. The rise of the starlet dates to India’s discovery in the ’90s of beauty treatments and contests, which now supply new bombshells, starting around $20,000 a film.
Movies featuring “women in skimpy clothes” are taking off for a simple reason, says Dr. N. Bhaskara Rao, head of the Center for Media Studies in New Delhi. “Producers make money, the starlets get media attention and everyone is happy.” Not everyone. Movie producer B. K. Deb says he dropped a Mallika Sherawat project because sex can’t overcome a bad story. “Sex flicks are a kind of parallel cinema… small-budget productions with low-cost stars,” says Deb. “They will always remain off mainstream.” Perhaps, but the box office will reveal all.
