Marathi Cinema

Marathi cinema is one of the oldest in regional Indian films industry. The first Marathi talkie film “Ayodhyecha Raja”[1] (produced by Prabhat Films) was released in 1932, just one year after “Alam Ara” the first Indian (Hindi) talkie film. Marathi cinema has grown in recent years -the industry is based in Mumbai, India.

Marathi Cinema is as old as Cinema in India. In fact the pioneer of cinema in India was Dadasaheb Phalke – a Marathi man, who brought the revolution of moving images to India with his first indigenously made film Raja Harishchandra. It was of course a silent film. However it can be called the first Marathi film as it was conceived by a Marathi speaking person.

As cinema grew in India, big production houses came on the stage and one of them was again a company owned wholly by Maharashtrians. It was indeed the mighty Prabhat film company. Some of India’s landmark films were made by the Prabhat Film Company, which, apart from being good cinema, had social responsibility and human values. Prabhat’s Sant Tukaram was the first Indian film to win the Best Film Award at the Venice film festival way back in 1937.[2] In 1954, at the very first edition of the National Awards, the winner of the President’s Gold Medal was Shyamchi Aai, Acharya P K Atre’s film version of the eponymous novel by Sane Guruji.  More Info >>