Nationalist Utopias and Science Fiction

Abstract

The ascendant genre of Indian science fiction cinema with its unique generic conventions and thematic codes, can be seen as symptomatic of a new change in the politics and the economics of Indian popular culture. While India's geopolitical ambitions and apprehensions have seen expression in science fiction films as early as 1967 in Wahan Ke Log, and its cultural traditions have been extolled in others like Kalai Arasi (1963), these films never had overt connections to religious or mythological themes. However, post 2000, the commingling of divine and religious elements with scientific or rational concepts, both in thematic and aesthetic aspects of the film, is so prevalent that it has to be considered as a generic marker of Indian science fiction. Combined with the altered geographic location of the events and characters in these films which almost always include foreign locations, this paper argues that this trend is emblematic of a change in the ideological deployment of popular culture as well as the geopolitical aspirations of the present day. By textual analysis of the plots, visuals and songs of recent science fiction films, this paper will investigate the bricolage of narrative strategies and audio-visual assemblages that seek to imagine a nationalist utopia and the political rationale for this configuration of meanings in this historical moment.