Bollywood's dark past is threatening to return

DISASTER. FLOP. AVERAGE. If you had to bet on a Bollywood movie's fate in 2024, those would have been your three best options in a year set to end with a 30-40% drop in box-office collections.

- Bloomberg

The world's most prolific film industry is desperately hoping for a better 2025. And so are the city's cops: When the theatres go empty, the body count starts to rise on the streets of Mumbai. That's what the 1990s were like — and everyone's dreading a repeat of lawlessness in India's financial capital.

The fears are far from exaggerated. Baba Siddique, a local politician and real-estate developer who enjoyed close friendships with celebrity actors, was gunned down in October as he was about to get into his car. A member of the gang that claimed responsibility said in a Facebook post that "Bollywood, politics, and property dealings" were behind the murder.

Organised crime and the show business of Bombay — as the megalopolis was known until 1995 — have been joined at the hip for a long time. The Golden Age of Indian Cinema that began around the country's 1947 independence from British rule had a 20-year run. Politics took a cynical turn in the late 1960s, and popular culture began to reflect the loss of idealism. Bollywood scripts shed the social concerns of a young republic and became the escapist fantasy the world knows today.