CASE STUDY ABSTRACT
Presenters: Anil Srivastava and Shampa Banerjee
"The Promised Land at the End of the Projector: Social Implications of Mainstream Cinema in India"
Shampa Banerjee and Anil Srivastava discussed cinema's power to set the mores, the fashion, and the codification of social behavior. Their presentation explored the mythological dimensions of Indian Cinema and its role as "the great leveler" in a society increasingly stratified by language, faith, political affiliation, and economic divergence.
Shampa Banerjee is author and editor of several books on Indian cinema and now works as a freelance editor and bookseller in California. Anil Srivastava began his involvement in cinema as an amateur filmmaker but has since abandoned filmmaking in order to devote himself to studying and promoting the works of others. Banerjee and Srivastava co-authored One Hundred Indian Feature Films: An Annotated Filmography and are presently engaged in creating a web site on Indian cinema.