The Age Of Cli-Fi: Has Bollywood Done Justice To Climate Change?

Even though the latter doesn’t mark many Bollywood movies, some recent dramas have forged their own paths. They’ve told stories of water crisis [Jal (2014), Kaun Kitne Paani Mein Hai (2015), Kadvi Hawa (2017)], wildlife conservation [Roar (2014), Sherni (2021), Sherdil (2022)], human avarice [Irada (2017), Kedarnath (2018), and The Jengaburu Curse (2023)]. Even a brain-dead dud, like Fukrey 3 (2017), devoted substantial screen time to Delhi’s water crisis. And at least two cli-fi dramas, Skyfire (2019) and The Jengaburu Curse (2023), told much more elaborate stories as web series. But barring Kedarnath, the male stars have stayed away from the genre, and none of these films became blockbusters. Besides, for an industry churning out over 200 productions per year, its climate-conscious output struggles to reach even 1%.

This reluctance seems strange, for Indians revere nature. Earth’s personification is goddess Bhumi (Sita’s mother). Shiva is married to Parvati, the daughter of the Himalayas. Rivers, mountains, and forests are considered sacred. Just like other natural elements: the sun and the moon, day and night, wind and rain. Bollywood lyricists have often turned to “hawa”, “ghata”, and “fiza”—air, clouds, and atmosphere—to depict joyous moods; spun countless duets on rains, mountains, and the moon; and imagined an entire city caressed by nature (Socho Ke Jheelon Ka Shahar Ho). Some songs value nature’s inclusivity (Panchi Nadiya Pawan Ke Jhonke); others extol its beauty (Yeh Haseen Vaadiyan, Yeh Khula Aasmaan); some talk to it (Maine Kaha Phoolon Se). If nature facilitated amorous activities (actresses bathing in waterfalls), then it also helped subvert censorship norms (two flowers cuddling to imply a kiss).

It figured in narratives and themes, too, as it’s one of the few things, even in this unequal world, that simultaneously affects a vast population. Consider Padosi (1941), where Hindus and Muslims unite in the climax to save their village from a flood caused due to the busting of a dam, owned by an industrialist seeking to divide the two communities. In Kedarnath, a Muslim man (Sushant Singh Rajput) sacrifices his life to save his lover (Sara Ali Khan) and her Hindu family, who had disapproved of him earlier, from the 2013 Uttarakhand floods. Sometimes nature unites estranged lovers, such as in Satyam Shivam Sundaram (1978) and Tum Mile (2009). And if a drought starts the Oscar-nominated Lagaan (2001), then a flood sharpens the Oscar-nominated Mother India (1957), where the female lead, Nargis, convinces the villagers to stay and rebuild the village, as they share an eternal bond with Mother Nature. Such dramas conveyed a “transparent message”, writes Pankaj Jain in a 2023 research paper, “respect and revere the Mother and be grateful for her blessings.”

Nature shaped Hindi films’ visuals, setting a picturesque trend. Javed Akhtar’s lines, Door tak nigahon mein hain gul khile hue (as far as I can see, I can only see flowers), compelled Yash Chopra to find a suitable garden in the Netherlands. Bollywood directors also shot countless romantic songs in the Himalayas and the Swiss Alps. Mountains appeared so often in Hindi movies that they became a “trope”, writes Philip Lutgendorf in the paper ‘Sex in the Snow’, “a plot in which a boy from the plains falls in love with a girl from the mountains”. It traces its lineage to Hindu mythology, he adds, where mountains were “erotic playgrounds” populated by “voluptuous apsaras” and “celestials” with “legendary libidos”. The ‘innocent’ and ‘virginal’ qualities of a mountain girl, such as in Kashmir Ki Kali (1964), feminised and exotified—and flattened—an entire region to disconcerting political ends. Such a masculine mainland gaze also looked colonial, not too different from the masculine-feminine binary in the British Raj era.

Some ‘mountain dramas’ also featured themes of man versus environment, modern versus traditional, impure versus pure. Take the genre’s famous example, Ram Teri Ganga Maili (1985), whose eponymous heroine (Mandakini), travelling from the hills to Calcutta, following the path of the holy river, is polluted along the way, as she snubs several lecherous men. (It finds a literal echo in the opening credits, where the pristine Ganga from the hills is contrasted with the sullied river in the plains.) Like Raj Kapoor’s last movie, many Bollywood dramas have named their heroines after rivers, a trend marking Kedarnath, too, whose female lead is called Mandakini. Water is a recurring motif in Swades (2004): Mohan (Shah Rukh Khan) takes long boat rides, discovering himself and his country; swallows shame when he buys a glass of water from a poor boy; and hears a line for the ages that resolves his conundrum: “Apne hi paani mein pighal jaana barf ka muqaddar hota hai [melting in its own water is ice’s destiny].”

Nature animated art-house films as well. Who can forget Durga dancing in the rain in Pather Panchali (1955), as her younger brother, Apu, watches her from afar, his body trembling, soaking it all in glee and awe, making the audiences feel cold. Satyajit Ray’s romance with Indian flora was lifelong, taking varied forms across different subjects and genres, from Kanchenjungha (1962) to Aranyer Din Ratri (1970) to Sikkim (1971, a documentary). In a 1970 interview, the Sight & Sound magazine asked him, “What is the best in your own tradition?” Ray replied, “Instead of saying ‘the best’, let us say ‘what is characteristic’. Well, start from the Sanskrit classics: the tremendous closeness to nature, even in the Upanishads and the vedas, and a profound philosophy.”

But, decades later, nature appears the least in Hindi films when it needs cinema the most. Or, like most things, Bollywood’s relationship with nature is instrumental: that when nature faced an existential crisis, an imminent threat to its own beauty, the storytellers found other greener pastures. Some recent exceptions, though, appear as documentaries which, like Ray’s movies, have put Indian cinema on the world map. Centred on two Muslim brothers who rescue and rehabilitate injured kites, All That Breathes (2022) tells a piercing story of ecological imbalance, pervasive callousness, and endearing compassion, hitting a poetic, ironic crescendo in the climax when the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2019 threatens to make the saviours extinct. It won the Grand Jury prize at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival and earned an Oscar nomination for the Best Documentary Feature Film. In 2023, another Indian documentary depicting climate change, Against the Tide, revolving around two Koli fishermen friends adopting different professional approaches in a dying sea, won the special jury prize at Sundance. The Elephant Whisperers (2022), hinged on a friendship between a couple and an orphan elephant, secured the Academy Award for Best Documentary Short Film.

Unlike Bollywood, which hasn’t done justice to climate change, some non-Hindi movies have excelled. The Tamil drama Koozhangal (2021), set in an arid village, told an unflinching story of rural despair, winning the Tiger award at the Rotterdam Film Festival and becoming India’s Oscar entry that year. Based on the Kerala floods, the Malayalam film, 2018 (2023), emerged as a box-office sensation, received rave reviews, and was selected as India’s Academy Award entry. “We chose the film,” said the selection committee’s chairman, Girish Kasaravalli, “due to its relevant theme of climate change and the challenges around development.” Another Malayalam thriller, Jallikattu (2019), examining the fissures between humans and beasts, was the Indian entry for the Oscars in 2020. And a recent Malayalam sci-fi, Gaganachari (2024), raised concerns about an oppressive right-wing regime and climate change. Other film industries, too, have joined the conversation. The Marathi movie Paani (2019), produced by Priyanka Chopra Jonas, won the National Award for Best Film on Environment Conservation. A Kannada drama about a differently abled man’s quest to save nature, Taledanda (2022), received wide critical acclaim.

But let’s also consider another pressing concern: the (environmental) costs of filmmaking itself. Because almost all its facets—from elaborate sets to cinematographic lights to short-lived costumes—leave huge carbon footprints. “Movies can emit on average between 391 metric tons for a small film and up to 3,370 metric tons of CO2 equivalents for large, tentpole productions such as Oppenheimer or Barbie,” noted a Time magazine piece earlier this year, “the equivalent of powering 656 homes for a year.” There does seem to be an alternative though: the AI-powered Virtual Production, which, producing any desired setting on a giant LED wall, can slash wastes related to travelling, set design, and lighting. A 2023 report by the Ulster University, in Northern Ireland, stated that it can reduce “carbon emissions by up to 50%”. The new tech, though, also raises concerns about the future of traditional filmmaking in an increasingly digital world, further snapping our contacts with fleeting fragments of reality. But then again, is it impractical—or vulgar—to crave utopia in a world plumbing dystopian depths every minute, every second?

(This appeared in the print as 'The Age Of Cli-Fi')