BOLLYWOOD

Cinema is an integral part of most Indians thereby making the Indian film industry the largest in the world. The Mumbai-based Bollywood's commercial Hindi film is its most prolific film industry in the world.

Bollywood is commonly referred to as Hindi cinema though Bollywood consists of the languages of Hindi, Urdu and English. The use of poetic Urdu words is fairly common. The connection between Hindi, Urdu, and Hindustani is an extremely contentious matter.

There has been a growing presence of Indian English in dialogue and songs as well. It is not uncommon to see films that feature dialogue with English words and phrases, even whole sentences. There are a growing number of English films. A few films are also made in two or even three languages (either using subtitles, or several soundtracks).

Bollywood films are mostly musicals, and are expected to contain catchy music in the form of song-and-dance numbers woven into the script. A film's success often depends on the quality of such musical numbers.

Indian audiences expect full value for their money. Songs and dances, love triangles, comedy and dare-devil thrills all are mixed up in a three-hour-long extravaganza with an intermission. Such movies are called masala films, after the Hindustani word for a spice mixture, masala. Like masalas, these movies are a mixture of many things.