Framing Epidemics through the Indian Cinematic Lens

The sources for this article are all in the public domain. The lists of films on epidemics that appeared in popular media outlets during the global Covid-19 outbreak offered a ‘canon’ of epidemic films from the Silent Film era to the 1990s. I have relied on both quantitative and qualitative analysis while examining my chosen archive of Indian films on epidemics produced between 2020–23. I compiled a dataset of around 40 films using publicly available sources, including online platforms such as Amazon Prime, Netflix, and YouTube, as well as media articles and curated lists from outlets like IMDb, Esquire, Vogue, and Hindustan Times. For analytical clarity, I divided the films into two phases: those produced during or after the first wave in 2020 and those from the second wave in 2021 through 2023.