A warrior stands atop a medieval tower. His sword glistens and his majestic robe flutters in the wind. Then he dives in slow motion and takes on his enemies who die minutes later after some death-defying stunts. That’s Tamil superstar Rajinikanth, looking 20 years younger in his next film Sultan—an expensive animated full-length feature to be made by the actor’s daughter Soundarya Rajinikanth.

Sultan is among many animation movies currently being made in India. The culture that began with 2003’s surprise hit Hanuman, a cutesy 2-D cartoon for kids, has moved on to an adult genre with films like Sultan and other mainstream Bollywood productions like the Ajay Devgan-and Kajol-starrer Toonpur Ki Superhero, Yash Raj Films’ Roadside Romeo and Karan Johar’s Kootchie Kootchie Hota Hai (an animated remake of the blockbuster Kuch Kuch Hota Hai). Shah Rukh Khan’s Red Chillies Entertainment promises too. In filmi lingo, these are the biggest and commercially most viable names in the industry.

This year, the Indian animation industry got an ego boost thanks to Apurva Shah, the animator of Ratatouille, which won the Oscar in the Best Animated Feature Film category. Shah, who has his roots in Godhra, has also worked on other highly entertaining films like Shrek and Finding Nemo. So this is a good time for Bollywood to join the toon business—when the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is raising a toast to Indian animation.

Incidentally, also at the Academy Awards this year, there were reports of how the organisers had to answer questions on why France’s Persepolis, a groundbreaking animated wonder, was omitted from its list of nominees in the Best Foreign Film category. The movie was nominated in the Best Animated Feature Film category but ultimately lost to Ratatouille. The film, a story of a young Iranian girl whose world changes as the fundamentalists take over her country, has been rated by several critics, like the BBC’s Tim Robbins, as the best film to come out of 2007.
Persepolis, like the other Indian animation movies in the pipeline, is not a children’s film. These Indian movies, besides being technologically superior, are moving away from over-simplified, exclusively for children’s stuff, to more mature and wholesome entertainment.

... contd.