There is much that Pakistan’s filmmakers
can be proud of. From production quality to the range of subjects taken
up, the variety and evidence of the potential to be mined is heartening.
Pakistani film industry seems to be
doing well and this is “nothing short of a Phoenix-like rise from the
ashes”, said a leading Pakistani daily.
An editorial “Film revival?” in the Dawn said that just a few years
ago, anyone making the prediction would have been dismissed for building
castles in the air: “that cinemas across the country would be doing
booming business and feeling confident in investing hard cash, large
amounts of it, into infrastructure”.
It added that nobody could have then guessed “that shows would be
running to packed capacity with even a queue for tickets; and, what
would have seemed most far-fetched of all, that audience would be able
to take their pick from new, locally made films for the silver screen,
some of them of a quality to hold their own against imported fare”.
“Serendipitously enough, though, this magical moment seems to have
come to pass. Over these Eid holidays past, so many new Pakistani films
were scheduled to be released that the screening dates had to be
phased,” it said.
Describing it as “nothing short of a Phoenix-like rise from the
ashes”, the daily said that the local film industry, which suffered
sometimes justified criticism for poor quality from the late ’80s
onwards, was more or less declared comatose once the television
landscape was liberalised and turned into a viable and paying
profession.
No comments:
Post a Comment