A four week period?
There are many Bollywood movies lined up to release in August. The pandemic bought dynamic changes to the viewing pattern in India, peopled started getting access to quality content, and bringing became a thing. The footfall in cinema halls reduced. Everyone tied to movies has tried getting movie-goers on their feet but it seems a lost cause now.
The result of which is filmmakers have decided to bring their movies into OTT four weeks after release. The earlier eight-week rule was followed but due to a major audience being in OTT it’s four weeks. The idea behind it is that producers make a loss due to less footfall at the theatres but early OTT release will compensate for the loss.
However, during the past few months, movie theatres have started to run at full capacity everywhere. Many movies did generate some revenue, demonstrating that the industry is rebounding. The different parties involved have thus chosen to stick with the previous arrangement. The films will be online eight weeks following their theatrical debut. The aforementioned regulation will take effect on August 1st. This indicates that all upcoming movies, including Raksha Bandhan, Laal Singh Chaddha, Liger, and Brahmastra, would have their online premieres on streaming services after spending eight weeks in theatres.
Here is what the Cinépolis CEO had to say
The CEO of Cinepolis India, Devang Sampat, verified this development and stated, “There was no regulation as such between the producers and exhibitors, there existed an agreement (due to the unusual circumstances). However, the actual producers have recently been in touch with us and emphasised the window of exclusivity for theatrical release.
What Akshaye Rathi has to say
A film exhibitor and distributor Akshaye Rathi sharing his thoughts and expertise said this, “It’s a mutually agreed-upon call. Movies like RRR and KGF – Chapter 2 have done over Rs. 1000 crores net business. Films like The Kashmir Files and Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 have done exceedingly well. JugJugg Jeeyo, too, has done really well. In that sense, the business has come back to normal. With absolute mutual consent and agreement between the production sector and exhibition sector, I believe movies are going back to having an eight-week window for the simple reason that it is in the interest of the producers. The streaming and satellite rights are sold for a fixed price. If the movie does exceedingly well on these platforms, there’s no upside to that.”
He added say “However, the box office is the only place which gives you an unprecedented lopsided upside. That’s the reason why every filmmaker would want to try and get a share of this pie. That can only happen when you give it a proper chance at the box office, that is, when the audience is not thinking in terms of ‘yeh film toh 2-4 hafton mein OTT pe aa hi jaayegi’. More than anything else, it’s about rebuilding the habit of the audience wanting to watch movies in theatres. And this only benefits the producers eventually. The more the box office collections are, the more the producers stand to gain.”