Aishwarya on SOUTH vs BOLLYWOOD

Aishwarya Rai Bachchan is a national star. While she has always been Mani Ratnam’s muse and together, they have brought forward mind-blowing movies, the duo has come together again for a film that has been the filmmaker’s dream project for the longest time. With the release date of Ponniyin Selvan-1 or PS-1 nearing, the promotions are in full swing. During one such event, Aishwarya spoke her mind about the Hindi vs South debate and stated that the language barriers are now being broken. She stated that now is a great time for Indian cinema as audiences are devouring content from across the country and even gave the examples of KGF 2 and Pushpa among others that became pan-India hits. “It’s an amazing time right now, where we need to break away from the typical way of looking at artists and cinema. I think it’s a great time right now, where all these barriers have gone down. People know our cinema nationally. In fact, they are wanting to see the cinema from every part,” Aishwarya said.

She further added, “I think this is finally the perfect time where it has become accessible nationally through so many platforms. Everybody can view cinema for what it is, across India. So, I think we need to kind of break away from this conventional way of thinking and help our viewers, our audiences and our readers also not slide into that typical way of viewing. Art has always been there, found the audience, and has been appreciated; so, have the artists. But avenues were limited. Today is a great time when it has become accessible to everybody. And proof of the pudding is in the eating, right? It is so evident that people are embracing and lapping up cinema from across the country.”