FilmIndia (Jan-Jul 1943)

June 1943 FILM INDIA tures of America. All along since 1935, the Columbia distribution offices have been very efficiently managed by Mr. N. C Lahiri, an Indian, and at half the cost that would have to be paid to an overseas manager. Jos Albeck who was the Columbia Far Eastern sales chief in 1935 often loudly thought that it was a good policy to trust local men if more business and better goodwill were to be secured. That has been the keynote of Columbia's success in India. War was a good opportunity for American producers fox' changing over to the Indian management but only a couple of firms seem to have taken advantage of this god-sent opportunity. The others are still perpetuating the old order which is so unpopular and so unbusinesslike in this country in these days of a national awakening. It is a pity Americans are becoming bad businessmen. FUNNY DRAWING ROOMS Film architecture in India, especially in our social films, is becoming less realistic every day. In several recent pictures we were surprised to see middle-class drawing-rooms having staircases and mezzanine floors inside them after the fashion of royal country houses in England. After seeing these creations by film architects we went in search of similar drawing rooms and in a month's frantic search, we could not find a single house with a broad staircase and a mezzanine floor inside the drawing room. These people who prepare our film sets are cheap copyists who get their inspiration from foreign decor magazines. But the fools miss one essential point that these foreign magazines portray architecture in foreign countries and not in India. A film must be a mirror of actual conditions obtained in the country, especially when producers seek to portray realism on the screen. Will the film architects show a little more sense and imagination? BLACK MARKET AND INCOME-TAX Producers, distributors and almost every one connected with the Indian film industry will have soon to face a terrible headache when this year's incometax returns are scrutinized by the income-tax officers. It is a well-known practice that the income-tax authorities require genuine vouchers for every small purchase made and when expenditure is not supported by such vouchers, the authorities refuse to accept the items as expenditure and add them up to the total profits for taxation. Pursuing this practice rigorously during the normal times would be justified but we do not see how this method can be enforced in the present times when almost everything has to be purchased in the black-market and the black-market racketeers don't print any stationery for giving vouchers. Producers have been buying wood, nails, paints, raw films, paper, motor tyres, petrol and many other things mainly from the black-market as nothing is available from the regular dealers. Even the regular dealers carrying stocks permit their goods to drift into the black-market to make a little extra money for themselves. When we discussed this problem with some incometax fellows they blandly replied: "Don't buy in the Black-Market." This is more easily said than done. Producers who have several lakhs locked up in their business have to keep the show running at whatever sacrifice. Like the income-tax officers they don't get a government dole at the end of the month. Motion picture producers have to stake their money and use their wits all the time to earn some living in a highly competitive trade. When supplies are not available from legitimate sources, producers are compelled to buy from the Black Market to maintain a semblance of business with huge overheads. Black Market has become a necessity if one is to survive. This problem of income-tax has become a community aftair as almost every producer in the country is affected by it and it will be in season for the Indian Motion Picture Producers' Association to tackle this ojb. tie no y Shamim is seen in almost every second picture of Ranjit. This one seems to be from "Gowri" another Ranjit picture. 17