Book review
So there’s this fat man, a huge black afro wig and a dildo, and they’re bouncing up and down on this big bed ... together...

Welcome to Bollywood.

This is studio city, a fantasy fodder factory, the Bombay-based film capital of the Indian subcontinent. Here every year the Hindi film industry pumps out twice as many pictures as Hollywood to satisfy the romantic cravings of its billion-strong audience, from the mobile-wielding middle classes who sit in the air-conditioned comfort of big city cinemas, to the villagers transfixed by dancing images flickering on a dusty courtyard wall.

Enter Hrithik Roshan, new idol of the silver screen, seducing both the industry and the women of India in a flurry of triceps and biceps, tight T-shirts and slick dance moves.

Bollywood Boy follows Hrithik’s meteoric rise through the celluloid firmament. It could be straight from one of the film industry’s own big budget blockbusters, with its heroes, heroines, villains, exotic locations, a cast of thousands, myriad costume changes and highly charged bop-de-bop dance routines. And like any good cinerama drama, there is the big chase scene as Justine tries to track down the man behind the hype, the hysteria and the silver disco suits.

But there is a dark side to all this, the moment when the lights go out and the hero stumbles, the moment in Bollywood when people die because they have not played by the underworld code. For beneath the glittering surface of India’s tinsel town lurk shady racketeers who use the film industry to make serious black money. In Bombay the underworld is king. Welcome to Bollywood.

Acclaim for Justine Hardy:

‘A distinctive voice informed by intelligence, sensitivity and a generous spirit.’
—Sara Wheeler

‘Tremendously funny and evocative.’
—Nicholas Colleridge

‘Hardy writes like a dream.’
—William Allendale

Published by Penguin Books India
• Published: 15 April 2002
• Imprint: Penguin
• ISBN: 071956154X
• Edition: Paperback
• Extent: 1pp
• Classification: Cinema
• Rights: India