This paper engages with 'Frankenstein' as a narrative structure in Indian popular cinema, in the context of posthumanism. Scholarship pertaining to monsters/monstrosity in Indian films has generally been addressed within the horror genre. However, the present paper aspires to understand monstrosity/monsters as a repercussion of science and technology (S&T) through the cinematic depiction of Frankenstein-like characters, thus shifting the locus of examining monstrosity from the usual confines of horror to the domain of science fiction. The paper contends Enthiran/Robot (Shankar 2010 Tamil/Hindi) as an emblematic instance of posthuman monstrosity that employs a Frankenstein narrative. The paper hopes to bring out the significance of cinematic imagination concerning posthuman monstrosity, to engage with collective social fears and anxieties about various cutting-edge technologies as well as other socio-cultural concerns and desires at the interface of S&T, embodiment and the society/nation.
This article aims to trace a history of Indian science-fiction (SF) cinema linking it with the scientific and technological milieu of the post-independence nation state. The tropes and themes that operate in Indian SF cinema across various regional film industries are juxtaposed against the sociocultural and political backdrop of the nation as well as against the historical trajectory of Indian science and technology (S&T) that manifested under the patronage of the nation state at the time of the films' release. The article foregrounds the underlying issues and anxieties that inform SF tropes and themes in Indian cinema and grant uniqueness and legitimacy to Indian SF films. Thereby, the article hopes to establish that Indian SF cinema is not just a derivative of western genres of SF, but works by its own logic.In this article I attempt to trace a history of Indian science-fiction (SF) cinema and, while doing so, foreground its uniqueness by highlighting the interconnectedness between post-independence India, its engagement with science and technology (S&T) and cinematic SF imaginaries. Recognizing and observing the co-evolution of these three entities challenges the notion that Indian SF films are simply an imitation of western SF. I classify Indian SF films into four phases, unravelling the social, cultural, political and scientific concerns
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