This article charts the history of Marathi cinema - the cinema of the Indian state of Maharashtra, where the Indian film industry was born. Yet while Maharashtra may now be home to Mumbai's commercial industry, Bollywood, Marathi cinema has strong traditions in non-mainstream cinema which in recent years has been cemented by films such as Chaitanya Tamhane's award-winning debut feature Court (2014), paving the way for a rise in Indian regional independent cinema more broadly.