Pollywood

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South Asian cinema

Cinema of Bangladesh Bengali cinema Cinema of India Assamese cinema Bollywood Karnataka cinema Kollywood Malayalam cinema Tollywood Cinema of Nepal Cinema of Pakistan Pollywood Cinema of Sri Lanka

Pollywood (Urdu: پالیوڈ)is a popular acronym for the film industry based in the city of Peshawar, the provincial capital of North West Frontier Province within the Pakistan.

1 History of Pashto film
2 Pashto film industry today
3 Pashto hits
4 Future of Pollywood
5 See also

[edit] History of Pashto film

The first Pashto film was made in 1939. Its name was ‘Laila Majnoon’. The film was released in 1942 and the people not only watched it in Peshawar, but in Quetta and Kolkata (Calcutta, India) as well. The director of the film was Mir Hamza Shinwari, while the composer of the film was Abdul Kareem. The heroine of Laila Majnoon was Habib Jan and the hero was Rafiqe Ghaznawi.

The Pashto second film was made after quite a long time during the 1960s. Its story was a translation of an Urdu film named, ‘Nai Kiran’ (Urdu) which translated to "new ray". The dialogues of the film were written by Mir Hamza Shinwari. It was displayed at Novelty cinema, Peshawar.

The third Pashto film to be produced was called, ‘Tiga’ which was made by Mir Hamza Shinwari in 1963. The hero of the film was Umer Daraz, while Ludeel was the cameraman of the film. Due to the success of the film in 1968 a film, ‘Yakka Yousaf Khan’ was released. The heroine of the film was Ghazali while the hero was Rab Nawaz. This film was inaugurated by Urdu film star, Rangeela.

From 1960 to 80s Pashto film enjoyed its great times. Its standard was on no grounds less than that of Urdu films till mid 70s and even 80s. If there were Waheed Murad, Nadim and Mohammad Ali in Lollywood (Urdu films), so Badar Munir, Asif Khan and many others were the chocolate heroes of the Pashto film industry.

[edit] Pashto film industry today

During these days cinema was the most effective way to communicate with the people as the standard of the movies were very good. Till mid 80s films were made on almost every subject and the people really loved to watch Pashto movies in cinema. So Pashto films played a great role in development of NWFP as though cinema used to situate only in the urban areas of NWFP, but people from far flung areas came to cities like Peshawar, Mardan, and Mingora etc to watch films. Now though the standard of the Pashto film has fallen very much, but the youths, especially the rural people still love to go to cinema.

Till 1990 there were some great names in the Pashto film industry. For instance, Mir Hamza Shinwari who was a producer, director and a great name in the Pashto poetry. Murad Shinwari is the one whose name comes in the list of the producers and directors who really served the Pashto industry in its real sense. Amir Ghulam Sadiq is the only name in the Pashto film industry, who did poetry for Pashto films for almost more than 30 years. But after 1990 owing to the absence of institutionalization in the Pashto film industry, there were no such dedicated people, which in intern created environment conducive to vulgarity and obscenity and the standard of the Pashto films fell.

Today, Pashto films seem to have lost their fans due to restrictions by the MMA government on their publicity through banners and posters of the film stars. The laborers who come to the provincial capital, Peshawar for manual jobs used to watch Pashto films in cinemas, but due to the bane the audience of the Pashto film has reduced tremendously because it usually comprises the laborer class who cannot even read the names of film stars. Pashto films which had a limited circuit of three cities: Peshawar, Karachi and Quetta, was already passing through a difficult phase and anti-obscenity drive of the MMA proved to be the last nail in the coffin.

[edit] Pashto hits

‘Yousaf Khan Sher Bano’ was made in 1969 and released in 1970. It was written by Ali Hyder Joshi and directed by Aziz Shamim.
‘Sandar Gharai’ (Singer) was released in 1970. Badar Munir was the hero and Yasmin Khan was the heroine of the movie, whereas Niamat Sarahadi was the villain.
‘Kala Khazan Kala Bahar’ (meaning some times autumn some times spring) was directed by Jamil Ahmad and produced by Syed Amir Sarhadi in 1970. The hero of the film was Aman.
‘Aalaqa Ghair’ (means land of no law) was made (produced) by Habibullah in 1971. Dialogues and poetry was made by Amir Hamza Shinwari.

Similarly ‘Darrae Khyber’, ‘Adam Khan Durkhanai’ (produced by Shakil Ayub and directed by Aziz Tabassum), ‘Musa Khan Gul Makai’ (hero was Asif khan and heroine was Yasmin Khan), ‘Bahadur Khan’ (hero was Humayun Qureshi), ‘Ajab Khan Afridi’, ‘Zama Badan’, ‘Maghrur’, ‘Oarbal’, ‘Topak Zama Qanoon’ (produced by Aziz Tabassum), ‘Dahqan’(produced by Badar Munir), ‘Baghi’, ‘Arman’, ‘Miranae Roar’ (step brother), ‘Tarbooz’, ‘Iqrar’, ‘Angar’, ‘Zakhmoona, ‘Navae au Nakriza’(Bridal and Henna), ‘Ujrati Qatil’, ‘Da Aoochea Khan’, ‘Prdang’, ‘Toofani Shappa’, ‘Bangri au Hathqardae’, ‘Ab-e-Hyat’, ‘Khulea Nave’, ‘Kufar au Islam’, ‘Da Karye Gorilla’ and many more are the Pashto hits form 1970-71 to 1985.

[edit] Future of Pollywood

Future of the Pashto film industry seems to be bright as there are still some people who want to do something for the betterment of the industry. For instance, Ajab Gul, who is a renowned actor and director in both the Urdu and the Pashto film industry. In 1999 he made a film, ‘Srre Sttergae’(red eyes) and through this film he proved that still there is a great potential in Pashto films as the story for the first time after many years was quite different and the cast, especially the heroine(s) were new and seemed that after a great hard work the film was completed. A few months back, another Pashto film, ‘Qalam au Kalashnikov’, written by Faiz Mohammad released. The standard was quite good and people liked the movie.