It’s All About Money, Honey! Part-II

Continued...

Is the 100-crore film a myth and a product of impeccable PR machinery? Or is it a result of a transformation in the economics of the film trade?

A 100 crore film is a dish whose recipe almost any greedy producer or film maker will be eager to learn. It’s a magic trick any magician would be envious to have knowledge of. So what ideally makes a film breach the coveted mark? A number of factors when put together work in its favor.

Photo Courtesy: Internet

The first and foremost trick is the inflated ticket prices. The average ticket cost at a multiplex today is Rs 140-150, compared to Rs 60-65 in single-screen theatres, according to BoxofficeIndia.com, a film trade portal. Prices at premium chains like Inox and PVR can be as high as Rs 300-350 on weekends (Friday-Sunday), which fetch almost 80% of theatrical revenues garnered by a film. The rest of the business happens during the “lean” Monday-Thursday period. On festive weekends, multiplex operators undertake a 10-15% hike in ticket prices. For 3D films, the rate is even higher. In big cities, single screen theatres, too, have increased ticket prices. For instance, the average ticket price across single screens in south Bombay is Rs 90-100. Hence, your pocket equally has a good enough hand in deciding which movie this weekend should rush ahead in the race.

Photo Courtesy: Internet

Your choice of theatre also matters. Despite high ticket prices, multiplexes have become a preferred choice for cine-goers because of the variety of films on offer, a better viewing experience, food and beverage counters and gaming zones etc. These attractions ensure that audiences keep coming back. Multiplexes have grown phenomenally in the last five years and completely changed the dynamics of the film business. There are close to 1,400 multiplex screens [India has a total of 12,900 screens] which constitute nearly 70-75% of a film’s box-office revenues. These numbers are ever-increasing much like our country’s dwindling wildlife population. By 2015, the number of multiplex screens is estimated to rise to 1,925, according to the FICCI-KPMG report on the Indian Media and Entertainment industry.

The third trick is more suited for people possessing interest in business sensibilities. Talking from the producer’s point of view who put in money and laughs off to the bank after his film receives the ‘good news’. The number of prints with which a film is released also has a role-in- play. Digital Prints and Wider Releases are both correlated. With the adoption of digital technology, more and more screens in India are becoming digitized. Digital prints save costs and can be attained fast. This is allowing producers to have a much wider release of their films with a massive number of prints. For instance, in 1995, Hum Aapke Hai Kaun released with 500 prints which was a landmark then; in 2009, 3 Idiots released with 1,000 prints which were considered a huge number; in 2011, Eros released Ra.One in 3,100 plus screens. This number will only grow and with releases getting wider by the day, sky-high theatrical revenues are becoming a routine of sorts.

Ever wondered why Salman books the Eid release slots years in advance or Aamir prefers Christmas? Most 100-crore films have utilized long weekends and festivals to the fullest, during which audiences drop in huge numbers and a film’s repeat value is high. Producers have often sacrificed a Friday which was once sacrosanct as a release day and tweaked their schedules to make the most of festivals by clubbing them with the traditional three-day weekend. For instance, Bodyguard released on a Wednesday and a five-day weekend surrounding Eid followed; Ek Tha Tiger released on a Tuesday and a six-day weekend with Independence Day and Eid followed; Golmaal 3, Ra.One, Son of Sardaar and Jab Tak Hai Jaan released on Diwali which fell in the middle of the week and a lengthy festive weekend followed; Ghajini, 3 Idiots and Don 2 released on the Christmas week, gaining heavily from the festive spirit and New Years’ holiday. See, how smartly movie releases are timed for their profit! Film critic Komal Nahta concurs, “National holidays like Republic Day, Independence Day and festivals like Diwali and Eid help in surging the box–office collections and if a major star cast and a big banner is involved, it definitely does wonders at the box –office.”

 

Photo Courtesy: ME!!! ^_^

Today, the business of films has become touch-and-go. The fate of a film is sealed on the opening day itself or at best, on the first week. The biggest of films have a run of only three to four weeks at the theaters as more and more new releases stand in line and eventually push the incumbent out. More releases in lesser time drive the producers to resort to the fore mentioned tricks to recover their bucks in no time. These four basic ingredients when cooked together doles out a guaranteed 100 crore blockbuster. Mind you! Script finds a place much later in the recipe book. As trade analyst Taran Adarsh sums it up, "Practically looking at it, box-office success has nothing to do with the script of a film. The biggest factor for this is the star power, which drives the market. Factors like release date, number of screens, and mass appeal also play an important role in the kind of business of a film does”.

At the end of the day, what scores more? Money or creativity? Stay tuned here to read an insightful debate.
Part III http://peechepardeke.blogspot.in/2013/09/its-all-about-money-honey-part-iii.html

Part-I http://peechepardeke.blogspot.in/2013/09/its-all-about-money-honey-part-i.html

 P.S. Any suggestions for future posts? Feel free to send in your suggestions and requests here or on my e-mail id: aanchal.srivastava20@gmail.com . Hope to hear from you soon :) 

It’s All About Money, Honey! Part-I

I searched frantically for my pink ear-rings that would go with the white top I was wearing. As I put them on, my little sister busted into the room and in her child-like voice said,”Didi, dadu aapka kabse wait kar rahe hain!” I replied, struggling with the ear-ring, “Apoo! Dadu ko bolo bas 5 min aur.” We were already late for the afternoon show. I wished we would reach on time and grabbed my purse. Announcing along the way to the people in house that we would be back only by evening, I dashed towards the door.

The afternoons in summers are pathetic! Especially when you are in a town where 80% of the day there is no electricity in the house, a house that dates back to 1960s. A house where all my uncles and aunts had spent their childhood playing under the huge mango tree in the garden (It is still there!). A house situated in a dirty lane of the dirty town Gorakhpur in this dirty country’s most populous state. My school had shut down for a straight 2 months in the middle of the year and like the obedient migrant birds, I flew down here to visit relatives.

After much deliberations and coaxing (which took most of our morning), Dadu had agreed to take the bachcha party, to the nearest cinema hall to catch the latest release, Ek tha tiger. Its star cast was all over the place last week promoting the film and this excited my cousin, Ajita. She would stage a drama in her peculiar nautanki style to persuade Dadu, the eldest in the house, to grant us permission to watch films. This time too, the trick worked much in our favour. As the rickshaw puller parked the vehicle in front of the gate, we could clearly see Salman Khan’s craze everywhere. Truck loads of people, had come down to watch him and only him, barring the charring heat. The place was brimming with people, overflowing onto the nearby road.  Long queues of head-strong visitors that ran miles and miles stood patiently waiting for the ticket counter to open. As I wiped the dripping sweat drops from the forehead, mine and Ajita’s eyes met and we shrugged our shoulders. Getting tickets won’t be easy this time.

Photo Courtesy: Internet

.....

In the evening, Dadu was uncontrollable as he vent out his angst on our way back home. It was as if the pressure cooker had been left to whistle non-stop in pressure, letting out the hot white fumes. I so wanted to tell Mumma to put that off but when Dadu is around, you need to learn to shut your chattering machine.

It is usually not easy to tick him off but when he sees “the sad state of Hindi movies and the poor choice of today’s young minds”, his blood boils. Rightly so, one can evidently smell how zealously passionate, he was, and still is, about films. The towering racks lined with innumerable VCDs, neatly stacked, are a testimony of this. Sangam, Awara, Teesri Kasam, Pyaasa, Shree 420,Guide, Do Biga Zameen he had it all there. He at times boasts of how he used to dedicatedly save money from his day-to-day spending to take my Dadi for the latest cinema, the tiny theatre was showing, two lanes away.

“I don’t understand this 100 crore figure thing”, he lamented,” they have reduced the art of film making to mere business”, he exploded into the house. Now, that sent me off thinking.

.....

The so-called 100-crore club is a nomenclature coined by the media in the most recent past, a term used by the film industry to segregate the more successful stars from the rest. The term has become rather ubiquitous and everyone from the commoner lining the street leading to Film City to the spotboy on the set is talking about it.  It’s cool, it’s coveted, and it’s for the crème de la crème. The latest status symbol in Bollywood: The 100-crore club!

Photo Courtesy: Internet

It all started with Ghajini in 2008, the first Bollywood film to gross 100 crore at the box office, taking only 18 days to do so. It was followed up in 2009 with 3 Idiots which took half the time to reach the magical figure. Incidentally, 3 Idiots remains the highest-grossing Bollywood film of all time with worldwide collections of Rs 339 crore (domestic + overseas). Hence, in that regard, Aamir Khan has been labelled as the inaugural inductee of the club.

If 2008 and 2009 had one 100-crore film each, 2010 saw that number double, with Salman Khan (Dabangg) and Ajay Devgn (Golmaal 3) entering the club. While the latter took 17 days to breach the mark, the former did it in 10 days.

In 2011, that figure rose to five films (Ready, Singham, Bodyguard, Ra.One and Don 2) with Bodyguard garnering 100 crore in a record-time of 7 days. Suddenly, every top Bollywood actor, mostly the Khans, was in a race to make it to the exclusive club. Salman Khan had breached the mark thrice in succession, while Shah Rukh was the last of the ruling Khans to get an entry into the coveted club.

In 2012, eight films (Agneepath, Housefull 2, Rowdy Rathore, Bol Bachchan, Ek Tha Tiger, Barfi!, Son of Sardaar and Jab Tak Hai Jaan) have grossed 100 crore. Salman Khan, who’s become his own competition when it comes to box-office collections, broke his own previous record set by Bodyguard as his Ek Tha Tiger rushed into the 100-crore club in five days flat. The film is the highest grosser of the year with worldwide collections of Rs 246 crore. Dabangg 2 was 2012’s ninth film in the 100-crore club, and Salman’s fifth straight – a “historic record” as trade analyst Taran Adarsh puts it. From one to two to five to eight, and from the Khans and Ajay Devgn to Hrithik Roshan to Akshay Kumar to the Kapoors – Bollywood’s 100-crore club has only grown manifold. Nowadays, the buzz preceding the release of every other big-budget film has its mention.

Photo Courtesy: Internet

This year, only a few films so far have been able to add to its population. Films like the Ranbir Kapoor-starrer Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani, the multi-starrer Race 2 and Mohit Suri’s Aashiqui 2 crossed the magical number. Aanand L. Rai’s Raanjhanaa, starring the unusual pair of Dhanush-Sonam also touched that mark with the combined collections of its Hindi and Tamil versions.

Is the 100-crore film a myth and a product of impeccable PR machinery? Or is it a result of a transformation in the economics of the film trade?

 Stay tuned to know more in this 3-part series on the coveted 100-crore club. Promise! Won't make you mull over it for long! It’s All About Money, Honey! Part-II, coming soon! :D

 Part II http://peechepardeke.blogspot.in/2013/09/its-all-about-money-honey-part-ii.html

Part III http://peechepardeke.blogspot.in/2013/09/its-all-about-money-honey-part-iii.html

P.S. Any suggestions for future posts? Feel free to send in your suggestions and requests here or on my e-mail id: aanchal.srivastava20@gmail.com . Hope to hear from you soon :) 

Sex,marriage, bathroom!

Talking about being late with movie reviews, give me two-three more opportunities and I’ll master it soon. Trust me, I m working very hard towards it! :P But then, barring a few , no movie has till date(since the time I chanced upon the opportunity to make you poor fellows read my  superfluous reviews) triggered me enough to put down my violent thoughts on Parde Ke Peeche within no time ‘The End’ flashes on the silver screen.

Weekends mean ‘movie time’ and last weekend single screen theatres in Udupi were showcasing, Shudh Desi Romance, a vibrant, youthful film that had before its release created much anticipation among the youngsters, as I could sense from scanning the more than half-filled hall.

A poster of the film. Photo courtesy: Internet

Shudh+Desi+ Romance= so wrongly christened!

An apt title would be hmm.... Sex, marriage, bathroom! LOL. Well, the whole story revolves around these three things only! :P

Opening sequence: Raghu Ram (Sushant Singh Rajput) is a tourist guide in Jaipur, who also doubles up as rental baraati for Goyal (Rishi Kapoor), a wedding planner. Raghu is suffering from pre-marital jitters. On his way to his wedding venue, Raghu meets Gayatri (Parineeti Chopra), an open minded, free willed, independent woman who lives life on her own terms. An already confused Raghu, heavily impressed by her freedom, gathers the guts to run away from his own wedding, with the ‘tailet’ showing him the escape way(read: bathroom).

A fortnight later, the two meet and begin dating. Entering into a live-in-relationship(read:sex), the two decide to get married(read: marriage). On the day of the wedding, Gayatri runs out on him(read:bathroom), and Raghu is left inconsolably confused.

Soon after, at a wedding, Raghu meets Tara (Vaani Kapoor), the woman he was going to tie the knot with, before he met Gayatri. She asks him out initially on a revenge trip but slowly their relationship turns serious(read:sex). Just as he is about to ask her to marry him (read: marriage), Gayatri re-enters his life and Tara sneaks away. The two(Gayatri and Raghu) decide on marrying(read:marriage)! They both run away from their own marriage(read: bathroom).

P.S. By this point, toleration power of most of my co-viewers is exhausted and many are hurling abuses at the characters onscreen.

So, now you know, the story is all about, sex,marriage, bathroom, marriage, sex, bathroom marriage ,sex, bathroom, sex, marriage, bathroom..........*phew!

A still from the movie. Photo courtesy: Internet

A still from the movie. Photo courtesy: Internet

Much ado was made about the 27 kisses in the film. Factually, its wrong. Not 27, but yeah around 14-15 do find a place in between dialogues or when the characters have nothing to do.  They kiss at the same rate as Arnab Goswami pukes his patented ‘the nation demands an answer’ dialogue every night at news hour.

The story being set in the pink city Jaipur imbibes a lot of its colorful culture and uniqueness. Places like Hawa Mahal and numerous other Rajput forts provide for a breath taking setting, making everything look pleasant on screen.

Debutant Vaani Kapoor is impressive and gorgeous. Kapoor is there because Shuddh Desi Romance needed to kill the three-quarters of the second half that precede the climax. Tara, humorously pops the question," Tum paida hi tharki hue the ya koi infection lagi thi?", echoing my sentiments. Gayatri  is a rebel without a cause: she smokes and has had boyfriends in the past. Parineeti is natural and beautiful as always.

Debutante Vaani Kapoor.
Photo courtesy: Internet

With so much revolving only around sex and kisses, one would expect sizzling chemistry on screen much like the Sakurajima volcano in Japan but proved out to be like mount Ashitaka: non-existent!

Music by the composer duo Sachin-Jigar is refreshing and youthful. My personal favorite is ‘Gulabi’.  

If all the sex and kissing hasn't interested you much, then Goyal uncle would surely do. This is one guy for solely whom you can give this movie a watch. This man is in the most illustrious years of his life, doing the best roles, churning out impressive performances at 60 with ease like never before. As the bemused wedding decorator who is also a father figure to Raghu, Rishi Kapoor, is charming, funny and with his dialogue delivery, he will force you to laugh wholeheartedly and keep clapping.The way he looks, pauses and spurts the witty one-liners is interesting to watch. He very amusingly summarises everything,"Tu Tara ko mandap mein chod ke bhag gaya kyunki tu usse shaadi nahi karna chahta, Tara tujhse shaadi nahi karna chahti kyunki tu use mandap mein chod ke bhag gaya tha aur Gayatri tujhse shaadi nahi karna chahti kyunki usne tujhe mandap se bhagte hue dekha tha. Yaar tum log itna bhagte kyun ho? Zindagi bhar bhagte hi rahogey ya kabhi rukogey bhi?"
P.S. Don't fail to notice the artificial flower he pins to his coat like Bose! :P

And because I care so much for your embarrassment out pour, I would like to whisper into your tiny ears that this is definitely not  a film to be included in your weekend outing with your family. That assured, it is a one time watch and you won't curse yourself much or the makers since they have put you in for just 120 minutes torture. That's such a saving grace!