The Indian film industry is the largest in the world (1200 movies were released in the year 2002)[citation needed]. India also features the cheapest cost of tickets in the world (the average ticket cost only 20 US cents), and the biggest movie studio in the world, Ramoji Film City [citation needed]. The industry is supported mainly by the vast cinemagoing Indian public, although Indian films have been gaining increasing popularity in the rest of the world — especially  in countries with large numbers of expatriate Indians.

Regional film industries

A cinema hall in Delhi India is a large country where many languages are spoken. Each of the larger languages supports its own film industry: Urdu/Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam

Art cinema

In addition to commercial cinema, there is also Indian cinema that aspires to seriousness or art. This is known to film critics as “New Indian Cinema” or sometimes “the Indian New Wave” (see the Encyclopedia of Indian Cinema), but most people in India simply call such films “art films”.

From the 1960s through the 1980s, the art film was usually government-subsidised:  aspiring directors could get federal or state government grants to produce non-commercial films on Indian themes. Many of these directors were graduates
of the government-supported Film and Television Institute of India. Their films were showcased at government film festivals and on the government-run TV station, Doordarshan. These films also had limited runs in art house theatres in India and overseas. Since the 1980s, Indian art cinema has to a great extent lost its government patronage. Today, it must be made as independent films on a shoestring budget by aspiring auteurs, much as in today’s Western film industry.

The art directors of this period owed more to foreign influences, such as Italian Neo-Realism or the French New Wave, than they did to the genre conventions of  commercial Indian cinema. The best known New Cinema directors were Bengali: Satyajit Ray, Ritwik Ghatak, and Bimal Roy. Some well-known films of this movement include the Apu Trilogy by Ray (Bengali), Meghe Dhaka Tara by Ghatak (Bengali) and Do Bigha Zameen by Roy (Hindi).

Art cinema was also well-supported in the state of Kerala. Malayalam movie makers like Adoor Gopalakrishnan, G. Aravindan, T. V. Chandran, Shaji N Karun, and M. T. Vasudevan Nair were fairly successful. Starting the 1970s, Kannada film-makers from Karnataka state produced a string of serious, low-budget films. Girish Kasaravalli is one of the few directors from that period who continues to make non-commercial
films.

Birth of Indian Cinema

In the year 1896, Dadasaheb Phalke just noticed Pea plant growing , and made the First ever Documentary “Birth of a Pea Plant”. Then Dadasaheb went to London to gain further knowledge and to screen “Birth of a Pea Plant”.On seeing , he was invited by Hollywood to Direct for them. Dadasaheb clearly mentioned that I will make only Indian films, for my country and returned with camera . So made a Silent Film Raja Harishchandra , which gave Birth to Indian Cinema Released on 3rd May 1913. In this film , male actors only played Females .

Then Dadaji thought , now its time to give Female Actor to Industry and so made Mohini Bahamasur and Introduced forst ever Actress to Indian Film Industry,

Now , It was the time to give sound to Indian Film Industry so he started researching on Sound and Created Bombay Talkies Studio. Under Bombay Talkies, First Talkie Film ALAM ARA – Directed by Ardeshar Irani was released in 1931.

The Film ALAM ARA starred Prithviraj Kapoor, Zubeida

And Then Journey of Indian Film Industry began and till date has more then 80000 Released films