Abstract
One of the important public values that films may promote is religious or spiritual value. The conditions under which religious stories and iconography are configured and religious devotion is constituted in Indian cinema suggest a number of important conclusions about the relationship between film and religion. This chapter explores one understudied idiom of Hindi Cinema, which is the rich and widely ramified pattern of storytelling based on reincarnation. Past-life recognition is of signal importance to reincarnation stories. Karma is essential to South Asian beliefs about reincarnation. The idea of a romance that is affirmed through separation and fuses both the earthly and the divine certainly plays a key role in the Hindu tradition through the story of Rhada-Krishna and its poetic refinement in canonical works like the 12th-century Gita Govinda ( Song of Govinda the Cowherd) by Jayadeva.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | A Companion to Motion Pictures and Public Value |
| Editors | Mette Hjort, Ted Nannicelli |
| Publisher | Wiley-Blackwell |
| Chapter | 12 |
| Pages | 254-278 |
| ISBN (Electronic) | 978-1-119-67712-3, 978-1-119-67715-4 |
| ISBN (Print) | 978-1-119-67711-6 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Jan 2022 |