Ollywood movies to go English

Using English titles in Odia movies goes long back to 1951 when director Kalyan Gupta made a movie titled “Roles To Eight”. It was the first social and fourth Odia film. No other movie director in Odisha wanted an English title till Hara Pattnaik made “I Love You” in 2004.
Since then, there has been quite a few movies including, “Barsa, My Darling”, “Nandini, I Love You”, “Most Wanted”, “O My Love”, “Dream Girl”, “Love dot com”, “Prem Weds Priya”, “Family No.1”, “143 I Love You” and “Babu, I Love You”, “Something… something” have liberally used English words in the titles.
The question now remains whether this usage is contributing in any which way to make the BO success? Or is this trend just another mindless imitation of Hollywood?
Director Sanjay Nayak agrees that following Hollywood is definitely an important reason for making this title choice. “Using English words make the title sound striking. This is also an attempt to attract the youngsters who would rather love an English title than an Odia one. This is also an endeavour to offer something hatke to the movie-goers of Odisha. Another relevant factor these days is that the English names could also be a result of the scripts’ demands.”
Not just English, in some cases, Odia directors are also opting for Hindi phrases in the movie titles leading many to speculate whether this trend might ultimately lead to minimal usage of Odia words in movie titles. “Normally, we choose from four to five titles for a story. The final title is given keeping in mind which name goes best with the storyline. The most important thing while choosing the title of a movie is that it should be catchy and easy for people to remember. In my case, I give titles that are more colloquial. It may be in English or in Odia,” says director Ashok Pati, who has titled most of his movies in English.
Continuing further, Pati says that these days speaking in a punch language is very common and most youngsters prefer to use English words in their conversation for better communication. “We love to address our mother as mummy rather than bou. I see no reason why we shouldn’t be using English names. If the title reflects the character and can appeal to a large per centage of our target audience, it doesn’t matter if which language it is in. For me, it’s important that the name reflects the genre of the movie too,” says Pati.
However, director Basant Sahu has a different take on this trend. “The trend of giving English titles in Odia movies is a very bad practice and should be avoided. It has nothing to do with the taste of the audience. If a simple and catchy Odia title is given, it will be more acceptable to our audience. Our film makers must try to give that Odia taste in the title of the movies rather than get swayed away by Hollywood,” Sahu insists.
What’s surprising is that there are some movie titles using Hindi and English words that are written in the Odia script! That’s primarily done for easier comprehension of those who might not be able to read English effortlessly.
“The day is not far when there will be no movies with Odia titles. Don’t we have catchy words in Odia? Why should we be inspired by other languages?” Sahu asks, adding, “Film makers must realise that giving an English name doesn’t help the movie’s BO prospects. Directors should try to give Odia titles and love the Odia words rather than fall into the trap of using English.”
Opinions will vary and now it is up to the directors to decide on whether they wish to mind their language or not.