Why I vote for Malayalam movies?

Have you watched Pranchiyettan and the Saint, Malarvadi Arts Club, Cocktail or Anwar - great Malayalam movies from 2010? Malayalam films are a great way to learn about the culture and language of people in Kerala, South-India. I guess when you haven’t lived or traveled around in India, it is difficult to imagine how different are the languages spoken around there and how many different cultures, traditions, food and way of living you can find in this one country. I actually had a feeling that if there wasn’t a train system and Bollywood films, this could not function as one India. Well, am I right or wrong, but what I also love about this place is that although they are proud of being Indian, every locality is also focusing very much on keeping their unique culture, traditions, language, believes and traces of history alive. And this is why I end up traveling again and again in their beautiful country.

Bollywood is watched all over in India. The actors and actresses are like gods and goddesses. Their lives are followed almost from every home in this country. But there is also something for different cultures of India, the country has 28 states and most of them have their own official languages in addition to English and Hindi. So for example for Bengalis there is a film industry in Kolkata called Tollywood and in Chennai there is Kollywood for South-Indian communities. Actually not every language in India has a separate film industry, bigger communities do.

Malayalam is the official languages in Kerala and there are more than 33 thousand native speakers of this language. It is big enough to manage its separate film industry. If for some reason you would like to learn few words in Malayalam, then this link gives some starting praises and this one would guide you through with audio lessons. Lot of foreigners coming to India end up in beautiful Kerala: beaches, temples and relatively relaxed atmosphere bring them here. And why not to learn few words in a local language before you arrive.

Malayalam films are made in Kerala itself. If you have some skills of Malayalam, you could start learning the rich culture of Kerala people through their films. Don’t worry if your language skills are not yet there, you would get the idea and the atmosphere, the music, songs and dances from the film anyway.

One of their famous actors is for example Mammootty, who has been playing in more than 300 films as the main hero. Try watching his film Trishna, this is one very important milestone in his career.

If you have already watched couple of currently popular Bollywood films, then you would notice that Malayalam movies are more conservative and have kept more of their local cultural atmosphere. Yet it’s interesting to know that the first 3D film in Inda was a Malayalam movie.

Films are great way to learn bout the culture. So watch Malayalam movies and learn about the mindset of people in Kerala. Luckily there is a great selection of Malayalam movies online available as well. So you can learn about this community even from distance.