MUMBAI, India—When James Cameron’s magnum opus opened in India, a small over-zealous group of Hindus apparently took offense to the term “avatar,” which in Sanskrit means reincarnation or descent from a higher realm to a lower realm.
According to this group, they felt they had proprietary rights over the word “avatar,” and to taint its meaning for the purpose of fiction on-screen could be offensive to Hindus. The controversy died a natural death when people were transported into another virtual reality world, which had no connection with Hinduism.
Avatar surprised the trade pundits and the Indian movie industry with a movie that the world is calling a phenomenon. In fact, the opening of the film in India ranked among the top 10 countries for a weekend’s performances, beating the likes of traditionally better performing countries like Taiwan, Singapore, New Zealand, Sweden, Holland, and Hong Kong.
What is interesting is that Avatar was released across India in English, Hindi, Tamil, and Telugu. Dubbed films started to be taken seriously when the likes of Anaconda, X-Men, and Spider-Man fetched higher returns in their dubbed versions compared to their English releases.
Dhiraj Shah at Big Entertainment believes that the dubbed market always had potential. “Gandhi, Jurassic Park, and Titanic all did great business in their dubbed versions. Yet, it was completely overlooked until a few years back when the sheer magnitude of the dubbed films’ success begged attention,” he said.
According to this group, they felt they had proprietary rights over the word “avatar,” and to taint its meaning for the purpose of fiction on-screen could be offensive to Hindus. The controversy died a natural death when people were transported into another virtual reality world, which had no connection with Hinduism.
Avatar surprised the trade pundits and the Indian movie industry with a movie that the world is calling a phenomenon. In fact, the opening of the film in India ranked among the top 10 countries for a weekend’s performances, beating the likes of traditionally better performing countries like Taiwan, Singapore, New Zealand, Sweden, Holland, and Hong Kong.
What is interesting is that Avatar was released across India in English, Hindi, Tamil, and Telugu. Dubbed films started to be taken seriously when the likes of Anaconda, X-Men, and Spider-Man fetched higher returns in their dubbed versions compared to their English releases.
Dhiraj Shah at Big Entertainment believes that the dubbed market always had potential. “Gandhi, Jurassic Park, and Titanic all did great business in their dubbed versions. Yet, it was completely overlooked until a few years back when the sheer magnitude of the dubbed films’ success begged attention,” he said.
