MUMBAI: Bollywood director Zoya Akhtar believes that star power keeps the Hindi film industry alive."I think the star system works on a level. Apart from Hollywood, India and China no other film industry is surviving. We are surviving because we have our stars and our audience wants to watch our people. We would have been eaten up. Europe has been eaten up by Hollywood right now," the 39-year-old said here Thursday while speaking at a session at FICCI-FRAMES.

The 13th edition of FICCI FRAMES began Wednesday and ends Friday.

Stressing further upon the importance of stars, Zoya said while the critics loved her first film "Luck By Chance", the audience did not come to see it but "Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara" drew them in.

"The film (‘Luck By Chance’) got me every possible nomination. I won the best debut, all the critics loved it and they loved me. They actually pushed the film, which they don’t really do. They wrote articles saying people should go and watch it. But people didn’t go and watch it. That’s where star power comes in. You have a Hrithik Roshan and a Katrina Kaif in your film and it equals bums on the seats," said Zoya.

Her last film "Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara" was not a hit just with the audiences, but critics too and the road movie about friendship and bonding won best Filmfare award too.