Bengali cinema has got `new birth`: Rahul Bose

Kolkata: Actor Rahul Bose today hailed the resurgence in Tollywood, crediting young filmmakers for giving Bengali cinema a `new birth`.

"I call it middle of the road cinema. The (new Bengali) films are not art house nor commercial. They are giving box office revenues but are content driven, which is attracting the masses," Bose, in town to inaugurate a multiplex in neighbouring Howrah, said. "In between there was a slump where we had only commercial cinema with no art house filmmakers. Now new options have opened," he said adding that people are now going to theaters in droves. The `Mr and Mrs Iyer` star gave credit to young Bengali filmmakers like Suman Mukhopadhyay, Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury and Srijit Mukherji for the resurgence. Bose said the film business in Kolkata has doubled in the last few years. "Three years ago, a big movie would do business of Rs 2.5 crore, now it has increased to Rs 5.5-6 crore. While a medium budget movie would be worth Rs 1.5-2 crore, but now it is 3.5-4 crore. The business has jumped almost 100 per cent." When asked, Bose said his Bengali film `Laptop` made by Kaushik Ganguly will be released this April. In May he will start shooting for another Bengali film by Suman Mukhopadhyay to be followed by a film based on a Pakistani novel. PTI