mumbai when saratchandra chatterjees devdas hits the big screen yet again in june it may answer a crucial question does the new generation of hindi film audience like movies adapted from works of literaturein recent times hindi movies adapted from literary works have met with a disastrous fate at the boxofficethis is in stark contrast to the 30s70s when works of r k narayan munshi premchand and khushwant singh among others were successfully adapted for sensible cinemain fact the two earlier celluloid interpretations of chatterjees novel by p c barua and bimal roy were big hits does this signify a degeneration of hindi films according to scriptwriter javed akhtar mainstream commercial cinema has to ensure that a movie has all the masala to appease every taste a literary work may not be able to offer this to the audience moreover literature is rooted in certain cultures ethos and the ambience of a particular region which again may not work well with our audiences he saysmr akhtar believes that the changing profile of the indian middleclass in the last three decades is responsible for a decline in movie adaption of literary works in comparison to the educated middleclass of yore liberalisation has sprouted a new breed that is neither literate nor intelligent our society has lost its rapport with classical literature which in turn is reflected in our filmsunlike in hollywood hindi films are not adapted from bestsellers because india does not have genuine best selling literary works in a population of 100 crore our socalled successful books do not even sell one lakh copies he addsindustry observers attribute the increasing emphasis on youthcentric films as another reason the urban youth has emerged as the biggest audience of hindi films both in india as well as abroad says filmmaker govind nihalaniin fact several producers encourage directors to deal with only those themes that the urban youth can identify with moreover our movies are written directed and designed by people who are young according to the maker of several serials and films adapted from literary works including deham hazaar chaurasi ki maa aakrosh and tamasaccording to mr nihalani literature usually focusses on serious issues which are looked upon as tedious and boring by the aam jantahence such films usually do not work at the boxoffice our audiences want entertainment that does not tax their brainsconcurs director dev benegal literature reflects a social milieu and bollywood does its best to escape from reality he says one reason could also be that the hindi film industry does not value originalityour industry is lazy people would rather watch hollywood films and direct a remake rather than make efforts to direct an original screenplay he saysmoreover adapting a literary work into a film is no cakewalk author mahasweta devi says literature has its own language and the film director has his own a film can only work when both these languages can meet on a common platform i worked closely with govind nihalani for hazaar chaurasi