It’s hard to watch some Bollywood films without thinking “I’ve seen this somewhere before.” Certain scenes, certain plots seem awfully familiar. That’s because they came from other movies. The generous among us might say that the filmmakers are “inspired” or perhaps they’re making an “homage.” Others call it “lifting.”
This might be changing. Twenty-one films including iconic Hindi movies like Kundan Shah’s “Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron” and Satyajit Ray’s “Agantuk” will offer remake rights in a first-of-its-kind initiative during this year’s International Film Festival of India (IFFI), taking place in Goa through Nov. 30.
A paper published earlier this year by Richard Guerra, a student at Penn State’s Dickinson School of Law, estimated that 46 percent of all Bollywood film releases in 2008 were unauthorised remakes. But copyright awareness is rising, said Nina Lath Gupta, managing director of the National Film Development Corporation, a government body which organises Film Bazaar, a trade market which runs every year alongside the IFFI.
“We get several offers asking for official remakes of several of our films, so we thought we would provide a platform for this,” Gupta said. “We are always looking to remake foreign films but we have so many of our own stories that we thought why not offer some of them up for remakes.”
The “Available For Remake” section at Film Bazaar will start conducting business from Friday for four days. Films offering remake rights at the festival include the 2003 French comedy “Après Vous” and several of NFDC’s most prized films including Saeed Akhtar Mirza’s “Salim Langde Pe Mat Ro”.
Bollywood has always been notorious for taking inspiration from well-known international films. Will Smith’s romantic comedy “Hitch” was the obvious inspiration for Salman Khan starrer “Partner”. Sanjay Gupta’s “Kaante” was very similar to Quentin Tarantino’s “Reservoir Dogs”. The 2010 film “Knock Out” was almost a copy of Colin Farrell’s thriller “Phone Booth”.
Fox International successfully sued the makers of “Knock Out” for copyright violation. The Bombay High Court awarded Fox damages, the first such judgment from an Indian court.
Known for under-valuing its writers and often failing to credit them, Bollywood has long relied on “inspiration” to churn out movies. In 2009’s “Luck By Chance”, an affectionate look at the film industry, a writer played by director Anurag Kashyap tells his producers sheepishly: “I’ve written according to the DVD you gave me.”
Those days of transcribing from a DVD might be over. Vishesh Films, owned by filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt and his brother, who have often faced allegations of copying, bought the rights to Colombian film “The Hidden Face” for their film “Murder 3”.
Karan Johar, one of Bollywood’s most well-known filmmakers and producers, also bought the official remake rights to “Stepmom”, which was then made into the Hindi film “We are Family”.
“There is now a sense that you are being watched, and it might be more costly if you are sued for copyright infringement. Filmmakers and producers realise that it might be easier and safer to buy remake rights,” Manas Malhotra, an independent consultant who helped set up Film Bazaar for NFDC, said.
If the ‘remake’ initiative gets takers at the IFFI, Malhotra said NFDC would extend an invitation to other film markets, and also tap the rich regional cinema that India has.
