Superstar Amitabh Bachchan on Wednesday urged Hollywood to help his "Bollywood" colleagues find larger US audiences for their films.

Bachchan, a star of more than 150 movies and a former Member of Parliament in India, was in the United States to be inducted as a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador and attend a 12-day retrospective of his films. He told reporters that cultural barriers and poor marketing have contributed to lackluster US box office results.

"Bollywood is a movement known to Americans only through satire," he said. "That needs to change."

Bachchan said the Indian film industry could use help from American studios.

"We want to discuss how they can assist us. The Americans have a very good marketing system and pattern in place, which can, and should be emulated," he said.

Bollywood, the nickname for India's film industry because much of it is concentrated in Mumbai, turns out three times as many films each year as Hollywood, many of them escapist musical extravaganzas that captivate cinema fans around the world.

In the United States however, the movies have failed to lure big audiences to megaplex theaters where Hollywood shows the bulk of its offerings. Instead, they find much of their popularity among fans of art and independent filmmaking.

The recent Bride & Prejudice, directed by Gurinder Chadha in the tradition of Bollywood films, has generated only $6.2 million at US and Canadian box offices, or about 33 per cent of its worldwide total.