How Indian Cinema Fails Its Intellectuals

The cost of a culture that overlooks its intellectuals on the big screen

I recently re-watched The Man Who Knew Infinity and couldn’t help but wonder: why don’t Indian filmmakers make such films? It’s not as if biopics are unheard of in Indian cinema. But when they are made, they usually revolve around police officers, army personnel, politicians and bureaucrats—figures of power and authority.

Rarely do we see films that celebrate the lives of scientists, mathematicians, or academics. Films that explore their struggles or even just their daily lives.

The only notable exception that comes to mind is Rocketry: The Nambi Effect, but even that film’s production was likely driven by the espionage controversy surrounding Nambi Narayanan rather than a pure celebration of scientific achievement.

Take Srinivasa Ramanujan, arguably India’s most iconic academic figure of the past two centuries. It took a western filmmaker to bring his story to life on the big screen—much like how it took GH Hardy to recognise and refine his genius in the first place.

What about C.V. Raman? Venkatraman Ramakrishnan? Homi J. Bhabha? Satyendra Nath Bose? A.P.J. Abdul Kalam? Why haven’t their lives been explored in mainstream cinema?

Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer was a massive success, not just in the United States but globally. The Pokhran nuclear tests offer an equally compelling story—one with scientific brilliance, political intrigue, and national pride. Why hasn’t an Indian filmmaker taken up this challenge?

The answer, from an economist’s perspective, seems obvious: studios assume that such films won’t sell.

Filmmakers are driven by commercial viability, and the Indian audience doesn’t seem to gravitate toward films centred on intellectually dense subjects. Instead, we prefer genres such as romance, thrillers, and high-octane action.

While I am no way asking filmmakers to abandon commercial viability at the altar of altruism, what is stopping studios that are flush with cash from devoting themselves to dramas based on the lives of our intellectual superstars? Films of this genre are certainly less expensive to make than ones requiring heavy CGI or flying entire film crews across the world.

They certainly make drama-oriented biopics, but the preferred narrative is one of struggle against corruption, crime, or bureaucracy—often tied to the Indian dream of securing a government job (e.g., 12th Fail). While these stories are valuable, they leave out an entire category of human achievement that involves spending several eons feeling confused and stupid until “Eureka!” strikes.

Even though we don’t allow kids to run on the sports field, we are definitely a country that runs behind studies. But even your interest in academics is only valued on the assumption that doing so leads to that ₹1 crore MAANG job or that All India Rank 1 in UPSC.

We often wonder why India plays catch-up with countries like the United States and China when it comes to R&D, and the answer is simply that our culture does not value intellectual pursuit simply for the sake of it.

This needs to change. We need a culture that glorifies intellectual pursuit just for the sake of it, just as much as we value wealth or power.

Culture is more than language and religion—it is also shaped by the art we consume, and this is why the Indian film industry must play a crucial role in this process.

It is also possible that I am being unfairly harsh on both Indian audiences as well as Indian filmmakers. Maybe Oppenheimer was a massive success only due to the fact that it also involved the ‘grander spectacle’ of war and politics. Similar arguments could be made for other western films, such as The Theory of Everything and The Imitation Game - that they were not merely the celebration of scientific achievement.

However, is it not possible to make films on our intellectual heroes in the same fashion? Maybe through the lens of how extraordinary it was that those Indians managed to make ground-breaking discoveries with only a fraction of the funding or infrastructural support available compared to the western world?

Even if it may not be as commercially viable as other kinds of movies, our intellectual superstars deserve to be brought to life on the big screen. This also makes me wonder - what if academics started wondering about the personal economic benefit of solving some centuries-old problem? The human race would never progress.

So is it harsh to ask that filmmakers devote themselves to projects that may not sell as many tickets as other ones?

It’s time for Indian cinema to step up.

Let’s Make Academia Great Again.

MAGA over MAANG.

I’ll end this article with a short clip from The Man Who Knew Infinity, which is undoubtedly one of my favourite scenes in the movie. The conversation between Hardy and Ramanujan perfectly depicts an ideal mentor-mentee relationship in academia.

Edit: As I do not wish to change the original article I've written and posted; I'll be making changes or clarifications here.

Edit: I’d like to clarify that my post is specifically about mainstream cinema, not documentaries or TV shows. The audiences, cultural impact, and viewing experience are entirely different. Since I couldn’t find a concise way to articulate this distinction within the main post, I chose not to touch on it there. So no, Rocket Boys doesn’t count.

Edit: A lot of people have pointed out movies like Mission Mangal and that Pokhran film starring John Abraham. Let’s not even get started on Mission Mangal—there are plenty of articles dissecting its fictionalization, infantilization and dramatization. As for the Pokhran film, it leans heavily on a military narrative. Of course, nuclear tests require both scientific and military excellence, but Nolan chose to highlight the scientists in Oppenheimer—even portraying the military as a hindrance at times. In contrast, we always emphasize the military, bureaucracy, and politicians, while our researchers take the backstage. That’s my issue—and perhaps I should have stressed it more strongly in my article.