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The cast and crew of best picture nominee "Slumdog Millionaire" arrive at the 81st Academy Awards in Hollywood, California February 22, 2009. Left to right are actors Freida Pinto, Irrfan Khan, writer Simon Beaufoy, actor Madhur Mittal, producer Christian Colson, actor Anil Kapoor, composer A.R. Rahman, actor Dev Patel. [Xinhua]
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The largely Indian cast and crew of "Slumdog Millionaire" who gleefully stormed the stage at the Academy Awards signaled a closer nexus between the world's biggest movie industries, with experts hoping for a happy ending.
India, home to the world's most prolific movie industry, has long tried to draw wider audiences, including by recently forging ventures with Hollywood studios looking to offset sluggish box office sales with new markets and cheaper production costs.
Now, the thumping success of "Slumdog" and a global financial crisis, which has pulled the plug on much Wall Street funding for movies, are bringing Hollywood and Bollywood closer together.
Like India's IT industry, Bollywood may now aggressively tout cheaper facilities for animation films and post-production. "Slumdog" also showcased India's prowess in music and sound mixing, with Oscars for A.R. Rahman and Resul Pookutty.
"India is an important domestic market for all foreign studios and also offers opportunities to cut costs," said Rajesh Jain, head of KPMG India's entertainment practice.
"The Oscars will raise the industry's visibility further."
Studios including Sony Pictures, Walt Disney, NBC Universal, Viacom and Warner Brothers have already put more than 1.5 billion U.S. dollars in India for stakes in local TV channels and ventures with Bollywood studios.
Their first efforts, including Disney's first Hindi animation flick, failed to set the Indian box-office on fire, but analysts say they will be encouraged by the success of "Slumdog," which became the eighth movie ever to win eight Academy Awards.
"The Oscar wins for 'Slumdog' only bodes well for the Hollywood-Bollywood connection," said Nelson Gayton at the UCLA Entertainment and Media Management Institute in Los Angeles.
"The critical and commercial success of the film speaks to global audiences for films of Indian content, especially if they do so well in the USA to begin with," he said.
It bodes well for Indian films too, he said, which while popular in the sub-continent have rarely met with global success.
Cutting costs
"Slumdog Millionaire" was based on a novel by Indian author Vikas Swarup and filmed largely in the squalid slums of Mumbai.
It was directed by Briton Danny Boyle and distributed and marketed by Fox Searchlight, but many of the cast and crew, including co-director, Loveleen Tandan, are Indian.
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The graphics shows British director Dan Boyle's rags-to-riches love story "Slumdog Millionaire" which won big at the 81st Academy Awards Sunday night,on Feb. 22, 2009, in Los Angeles, grabbing eight Oscars including best picture and best director. [Zhang Liyun/Xinhua]
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The movie is seen by many in the industry as showing a way forward for Hollywood and Bollywood studios eyeing new markets.
