Designing and Building Reality in Hindi Film

For an industry that is known for its escapism, the quest for settings that look real seems out of character. Yet the achievement of verisimilitude in Hindi (aka Bollywood) film sets and locations has grown apace in the 21st century, even in star vehicles and cinematic spectaculars.

This book inquires into how and why this is done, and who does it, drawing the reader into the thoughts and actions of art department personnel, from production designers all the way down to painters and carpenters. The key to their work is time - making the most of the time they are given, capturing the signs of the passage of time in artificially aged sets, creating settings that speak of the present or the past through the artfully chosen or fabricated props. Their work reveals a little-known side to the film industry that is indispensable to the filmmaking enterprise.