The pleasure of repetition: The Bombay cinema and the South American telenovela

South American television soap operas (telenovelas) follow the same strand of melodrama as mainstream Hindi cinema, referred to here as Bombay cinema. Characters tend to be archetypes and the emphasis is on generating an emotional reaction. Both types of screen fiction attract legions of loyal fans, with series or films even acquiring cult status. At the same time, the critics and the educated elite of their respective countries brand the forms ‘repetitive’ because telenovelas and Bombay cinema rely on predictable formulae and many productions are remakes or transpositions, especially from foreign sources. I propose that the audiences of telenovelas and Bombay cinema derive pleasure precisely from repetition. Accusations of a lack of originality disregard the influence in their narratives of the oral storytelling tradition, in which what was important was not whether the audience knew the story but how engagingly it was told. Moreover, the predictability of the formula allows audiences to experience intense emotions safely and even to flaunt social rules.