The sprawling 2,000 acre expanse boasts Japanese and Moghul gardens, Hindu temples, a fort, a railway station, an airport, little towns and villages. A closer look reveals the buildings are a facade made of plaster of Paris and the blooming gardens are the backdrop for the popular song sequences in Indian movies. Built by Ramoji Rao, a leading south Indian movie and television tycoon, Film City offers outdoor locales, 40 studio floors, a movie prop workshop, extras and technicians, sophisticated editing and sound-recording facilities and even an earth station that beams television programmes directly to satellites.
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Film City pitches India as a low-cost producer for the global movie and television industry. And it has already attracted a few American producers away from Hollywood.
"Entertainment is perhaps the only business in which India is a global player in terms of volumes," says Amit Khanna, head of Reliance Entertainment.