Lollywood Biggest Movie Hits

Lollywood refers to the Pakistani film industry based in the city of Lahore. The word “Lollywood” was first coined in the summer of 1989 in the now defunct magazine “Glamour” published from Karachi by a gossip columnist Saleem Nasir. The film industry in Lahore started in 1929 with the opening of the United Players’ Studios on Ravi Road. The cornerstone for the studio was set by Abdur Rashid Kardar. Since then the studio has managed various indigenous productions competing with other film production centres in the undivided India, namely Bombay and Calcutta.

Most of the feature films shot in Pakistan are in National Language Urdu, Urdu is sometimes used in feature films of Bollywood at small scale, but are largely in Hindi, and may also include films in local languages like, Punjabi, Pashto, Balochi or Sindhi.

Before the Bangladesh Separation, Pakistan had three main film production centres: Lahore, Karachi and Dhaka. The regime of Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, VCRs, film piracy, the introduction of entertainment taxes, and Islamic laws, have been some of the many obstacles to the industry’s growth. Once thriving, the cinema in Pakistan now barely exists.

The Pakistani film industry is credited with having produced some of the most notable and recognised filmmakers, actors, writers and directors, and for introducing pop music to South Asia. Competition from Bollywood, however, led to the industry’s decline, although several Indo-Pakistan ventures are promising to help in its revival.