Is Pakistani cinema dying?
Pakistans once thriving movie industry appears to be dying a slow death. The number of movies produced has fallen from a high of 111 in 1977 to 50 in 2004; studios have dwindled from 11 in the 1970s to just three; and the total number of cinema theatres in the country today is just about 300. From lack of ideas to Bollywood, from viewer disinterest to religious intolerance, virtually everything is being blamed for the sorry state of affairs in Lahore, the industry capital. It is pathetic, says Aijaz Gul, a film critic attached to the Pakistani chapter of the Network for the Promotion of Asian Films, talking about the fall of Pakistani cinema. The highest paid star in Pakistan commands a price of one million rupees, and most movies – in Punjabi, Urdu or Pushto – get made for under Rs.7 million. This is nothing in comparison to Bollywood. Some good films are still made. Shootings still take place abroad – in Malaysia, Scotland and Spain. But the movies are still flopping. Yet there was a
