Popular Hindi films offer varied cinematic representations ranging from realistic portraits of patriotic heroes to complex fantasies that go beyond escapism. In "Dream Machine, " Samir Dayal provides a history of Hindi cinema starting with films made after India s independence in 1947. He constructs a decade-by-decade consideration of Hindi cinema s role as a site for the construction of Indianness.

Dayal suggests that Hindi cinema functions as both mirror and lamp, reflecting and illuminating new and possible representations of national and personal identity, beginning with early...

Popular Hindi films offer varied cinematic representations ranging from realistic portraits of patriotic heroes to complex fantasies that go beyond escapism. In "Dream Machine, " Samir Dayal provides a history of Hindi cinema starting with films made after India s independence in 1947. He constructs a decade-by-decade consideration of Hindi cinema s role as a site for the construction of Indianness.

Dayal suggests that Hindi cinema functions as both mirror and lamp, reflecting and illuminating new and possible representations of national and personal identity, beginning with early...