In 2007, the success rate abroad has been very less compared to that in previous years. Two reasons stand out essentially for this poor fare: huge star cast coupled with bad stories and sky-high prices boasting star power. How good is it working for anyone?! The producer who demands an astronomical price for the product, and is getting it, is definitely being benefitted. And, the distributors who do not have any cooperation among themselves are leaping each other with unaffordable rates and are grabbing half-baked products and are releasing them with very high ticket prices to unsuspected audience, so that they can recover their costs.
So, finally, who's losing in the whole ordeal? Poor audiences and exhibitors (sometimes distributors also) who are unable to recover their monies; the producers are happily laughing their way to the bank, giving statements of records to the media for a little more hype!
This year, it all started with the film Desamuduru, which was a super hit in India. The film was brought for Rs 80 Lakhs, as the film's director was Puri Jagannadh, the guy who made the blockbuster Pokiri last year. Yet, Desamuduru turned out as a damp squib abroad. It lost Fifteen Lakhs but it is exhibitors who lost heavily; most of them could not able to recover the theatre rents. As a comparison, Allu Arjun's previous film Happy was bought for less than ten lakh rupees (which includes the seven prints) and turned out to be a profitable venture for the distributors as well as the exhibitors, thanks to its affordable price. When Desamuduru was bought for an astronomical price, the result was distasteful, not because the movie's talk was bad but because it just could not get as much money as has been invested - the estimated loss is as high as sixty lakh rupees! Incidentally though, the same distributor got rights for Shivaji, also at a hefty price that was never before offered to a dubbing film, and the movie's successful fare abroad had given him a breath of fresh air!
Great India films screened abroad the films Jagadam, Madhumasam, Chandamama, Chiruta, and Tulasi this year. Except for the film Madhumasam, all other films left them in cold waters. Before the release of these films, however, everything seemed perfect and "hot". Jagadam, sold in the name of its director Sukumar of Arya fame, was bought for forty lakh rupees. Chandamama, the creator of which is known - particularly among NRI audiences - to be "not creative of late", but they went ahead and got the rights for twenty lakh rupees. Madhumasam was more of a break-even and even made a little profit as it was bought for a lower price. Chiruta, the debut of the megastar's son in combination with the director Puri of Pokiri, was bought for an absurdly heavy price of 1.6 crore rupees, ...plus prints! The ticket prices were hiked to be $16-25, but the film was publicized a lot too, but the film ended up in a loss of forty lakhs despite all efforts.
Tulasi has another story to tell: The film was sold for ninety lakh rupees, a sum such as which was never heard of for any film of venkatesh in the past, thanks to the success of his previous two films ( Aadavari Maatalaku Arthaale Verule...! and Lakshmi) in India. (It may be important to note that Lakshmi was a disaster in the USA while the former saw a business that was about break-even-to-loss abroad.) Eventually, Tulasi is saw a loss of at least sixty lakh rupees for the distributor, since no one seems to be interested in the film after it's bought and released.
RK Films, which gave the blockbuster Bommarillu last year, released three films this year - Munna, Yogi, and Happy Days. Except the latest project, the rest of the films left them unhappy with a loss of about a crore! These two flops were but examples of big movies with high price tags but poor story line, and have thus failed to garner decent openings even. Happy Days, on the other hand, was bought for a big amount, but it still paid off in spite of the story being a regular college campus love story, thanks to the name Sekhar Kammula.
Tolly2Holly screened Pellaina Kottalo, Dhee, Dubai Seenu and Aata. Excepting Aata, all others went ahead to become decent hits and brought profits too, as they were not expensive deals. Aata, which came from the much-celebrated production house and boasted a crazy lead pair, left them shocked and was really a dangerous "game" that left a dent of at least 50% of the seventy lakh rupees of distributors' money.
NRI Chitram released Lakshmi Kalyanam, Maharadi, Aadavari Maatalaki Arthaale Verule...! and Allare Allari this year. Aadavari Maatalaki Arthaale Verule...! was bought for ninety lakh rupees, and became an average, barely break-even fare for the distributor. The rest of the films, all relatively small films, left them with a loss of at least twenty to thirty lakh rupees.
KAD Distribution Company, which used to get all the big star cast films, has almost stopped screening films abroad. This year, they just screened Classmates, which was also because of their good rapport with the producer Ravikishore. Needless to say, the story was not a happy ending for them.
Prawasi Films got the rights of Athidi and Yamadonga. The former was priced more than the gross collections of Pokiri. Can they really recover such a huge amount?! The film was a losing proportion from the very beginning, in spite of charging triple the regular ticket price at places. Yamadonga was a break-even abroad, though it was a super hit in India, marking the first major decent fare abroad for the film's hero Jr. NTR.
Chiru's Shankar Dada Zindabad was one of the major disasters of the year. Being a very poor fare from the first show itself, the film left a big hole in the pockets of the distributors as well as the exhibitors.
Some other films like Seetharamudu, Raghavan (dubbed from Tamil), Adivaram Aadavallaku Selavu, Operation Duryodhana,, Evadaite naakenti etc. had single-day screenings or no screenings at all in spite of being bought into the USA.
Problems with distribution areas:Previously, we used to have a good market in Dubai, but the market there is now nearly zero. The theaters that were previously owned by Indians are now sold off to the local exhibitors who demand seventy percent of the revenue from the screening, which will not work out for Telugu films at any cost. In Singapore and Malaysia, however, rumor mill has it that pirated DVDs are being created after screening films in these countries. Thus, the producers are themselves apprehensive about sending their films to these countries.For these reasons, 20-25% of the market is nearly dry, and the burden of the cost is naturally put on the other areas such as USA.
Problems of the distributors:
Distributors do not have unity in this area. Every distributor is lapping on another with "better" offer to grab a film. Even after buying a film with such an extraordinary price, they do not have freedom to sell the areas on their own terms. Sometimes, they need to show the producer for the rates they are selling and follow their terms. Most of the times, they get their prints later than the initially promised time, which leaves them paying high rents for the theatres without any revenue, and this loss had never in the past been compensated by the producers. The worst part is that the distributors do get the prints but with some reels missing, and the producers promise to compensate only a very meagre part of the loss incurred thus!There was a time when the distributors were compensated if a film was a flop, by offering the next film (of the hero/director/production house) at a lower price, but that's not any more the case, essentially because the distributors do not have one voice of unison anymore. The producers are happily going with one who gives them the highest price, not bothering about the ones that lost money in the past due to their previous flops.
Exhibitors' problems:
The exhibitors have to pay a high price for a relatively small film too. None of the recent films made money to the exhibitors despite higher ticket prices, due to higher theater rentals and due to non-availability of decent theaters for screening, enough to attract viewers.
Audience problems:
Go to any film, they have to pay four times of what they can pay for an English film! Due to the higher rate of the ticket prices, families keep away from theatres. The rate of the tickets in the recent times hit $25 per person for films like Chiruta and Athidi which is too much for any cine lover to bear for one movie, not to mention the price for commute.Rumors have it that the distributors are planning to keep away from Telugu films for at least for next six months, so that films are offered at lesser costs. But, will they stick to their words with big films like Jalsa, Okka Magaadu, Dasavatharam (dubbed from Tamil), etc. coming in for the January? Sources say that both the straight films above are asking not less then a one crore plus each.
Do these heroes have that much market abroad? What was each one's last super hit film here? What profits did the film bring to the overseas distributors? Don, which is slated for release in December, was also bought for an astronomical price that crossed all the collections of Nagarjuna's films before. As long as the distributors and the exhibitors do not have unity, producers will happily make the hay while sun shines, and it is the poor cine lovers who end up paying higher and higher ticket prices for no fault of theirs. With these higher prices, if one is motivated to watch every film online, albeit a pirated copy, who's to be blamed?
Article by Sri
Compiled and Edited by Nachaki
1 comment:
Great work.
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