Why Bollywood will never crack the West

He watched Bollwood films as a kid, and loved them. But as an adult, and a British Asian, Nirpal Dhaliwal is "confronted by the hype and ubiquity of Bollywood," and says, "I wonder what the fuss is about."

This is not an uncommon reaction. Many of us will have heard friends gush about a 'fantastic' new film release, how it has broken Bollywood records around the world and nodded in agreement, but secretly thought to ourselves, "Why? How?!" For us, this article published in the Guardian comes as a refreshing take on the topic.

Dhaliwal's central question is this: "Why does the world's most popular cinema, accounting for well over two billion ticket sales a year -- that's two-thirds of global sales volumes -- fail to capture the mainstream Western imagination?"

He concludes that it's because Bollywood stories need to provide all-encompassing entertainment for the whole Indian family. That gives Westerners "the impression that they [Bollywood films] are loosely written, meandering and don't make sense," says Shridhar Subramaniam, managing director of Sony Music India.

This is one of the most clearly articulated articles on the subject of the love/hate relationship Indians around the world have with the dominant chunk of Hindi cinema.