Ten years after the first multiplex opened in India, the business continues to be under the shadow of conventional distribution methods
Next month, multiplexes will be exactly 10 years old in India. The first such film watching facility, PVR Anupam, was launched in Saket, south Delhi, in June 1997. But even as their numbers have increased exponentially and dramatically changed the movie watching experience for a wide swathe of urban Indians, the question continues to linger: have these swanky multiplexes had the desired effect on the overall quality of Indian cinema?
Well, for every independent-spirited Mr & Mrs Iyer, Raincoat, Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi, Iqbal, Dor or Omkara that has found ready takers in recent years as a result of the mushrooming multiplexes, there have been numerous other films that did not quite get their due. These under-performing releases have proved to be no more than faint blips on the radar despite the fact that they had everything to enable to find their niche in a packed out movie mart.
Despite the advent of the multiplexes, which have now also begun to infiltrate the tier-two cities of India in a big way after making their presence felt in the major metropolises of India, the showbiz landscape is still dominated overwhelmingly by Bollywood potboilers churned out by the big banners. The audience is clearly clamouring for better fare, but there is still no stopping trashy, run-of-the-mill flicks (like Shakalaka Boom Boom, Tara Rum Pum and Good Boy Bad Boy) from botching up the party. The reason is pretty obvious: the old, dilapidated single-screen cinemas may have begun to drop off the Indian movie map, yet the exhibition business is still run on largely conventional lines.
When a big-ticket release, say from the Yashraj Films stable, comes along, the basic premise of a multiplex – offering as wide a choice as possible to its patrons – is thrown out the window and the screens are flooded with a single star-studded film. So, if you happen to be somebody who is more interested in watching a film for its substance and treatment rather than merely for its starcast, you are compelled willy-nilly to bide your time for the star parade to end and the multiplex near you to come up with something more to your liking.
Worse still, when a small film starts off slowly – which is inevitably the case given the absence of saleable stars in the cast – it isn’t given enough time to find its footing. It is usually out of the scene before the second week begins. Big films, propelled by the stars, make a killing in a single weekend; small films take a while to warm up. ‘Small’ film that have gone to attain varying degrees of success in the past few years–bet it Mr & Mrs Iyer, Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi, Iqbal, Maine Gandhi Ko Nahin Maara or Bheja Fry–have reaped the benefits of an extended run. Patience is the name of the game, but do the multiplexes have faith in that essential attribute of the business.
The multiplexes were expected to empower the audience, especially those who love their cinema to be more than just an evening of fun, give them the privilege of choice, and let them dive into the diversity that Indian cinema is capable of delivering. If that hasn’t happened in its entirety, the time has surely come for the multiplexes to reinvent themselves a bit.
That exercise has probably already got underway. The number of multiplexes around the country is projected to double from the current level of 70-odd to over 150 in the next couple of years. The availability of seats is expected to jump from under 100,000 to 160,000. Interestingly, not all the new multi-screen facilities that are under construction will be of the same kind. They can’t afford to be.
At the current juncture, the multiplex boom remains a fringe phenomenon owing to their exorbitant ticket prices, which, in turn, are necessitated by the high costs of construction in a metropolis. Moreover, low occupancy rates, especially on weekdays, are a major worry. That pushes up ticket prices to make the business viable. Today, even at 35%-40% occupancy, a multiplex can survive. But can the masses survive the ticket price onslaught?
Building a multiplex in a smaller city costs only one-fourth of what it does in Delhi or Mumbai. It is therefore in the smaller cities that the multiplexes will, in the real sense, draw the masses into the incipient revolution. Then, and only then, will the multiplex boom get rolling in right earnest.
So, what does the future hold for the multiplex biz? The days of rundown movie theatres are well and truly over. It is now time for Indian filmmakers to move with the times and abandon their dog-eared ideas for good. Multiplexes were meant to cash in on the fragmentation of the audience. Now the multiplex business, too, needs to embrace genuine multiplicity by splitting into three principal categories. It probably is already doing just that: how else can one explain the recent commercial release of an experimental French anthology film, Paris, je t’aime, which PVR Pictures acquired at the Cannes Film Festival last year?
That sort of thing is increasingly going to become more a necessity than a mere option. The old but refurbished single-screen cinema will continue to proffer big-budget blockbusters, while high-end multiplexes will cater primarily to the discerning among India’s metropolitan moviegoers without really shutting out lovers of conventional entertainment. But much of the action in the next few years will be in the space provided by low-cost, no-frills multi-screen theatres, both in the metros and the small cities.
And that is when quality cinema that flourishes on the fringes today will move centrestage and grab a larger share of the showbiz pie. Can that be bad news for anybody?
Next month, multiplexes will be exactly 10 years old in India. The first such film watching facility, PVR Anupam, was launched in Saket, south Delhi, in June 1997. But even as their numbers have increased exponentially and dramatically changed the movie watching experience for a wide swathe of urban Indians, the question continues to linger: have these swanky multiplexes had the desired effect on the overall quality of Indian cinema?
Well, for every independent-spirited Mr & Mrs Iyer, Raincoat, Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi, Iqbal, Dor or Omkara that has found ready takers in recent years as a result of the mushrooming multiplexes, there have been numerous other films that did not quite get their due. These under-performing releases have proved to be no more than faint blips on the radar despite the fact that they had everything to enable to find their niche in a packed out movie mart.
Despite the advent of the multiplexes, which have now also begun to infiltrate the tier-two cities of India in a big way after making their presence felt in the major metropolises of India, the showbiz landscape is still dominated overwhelmingly by Bollywood potboilers churned out by the big banners. The audience is clearly clamouring for better fare, but there is still no stopping trashy, run-of-the-mill flicks (like Shakalaka Boom Boom, Tara Rum Pum and Good Boy Bad Boy) from botching up the party. The reason is pretty obvious: the old, dilapidated single-screen cinemas may have begun to drop off the Indian movie map, yet the exhibition business is still run on largely conventional lines.
When a big-ticket release, say from the Yashraj Films stable, comes along, the basic premise of a multiplex – offering as wide a choice as possible to its patrons – is thrown out the window and the screens are flooded with a single star-studded film. So, if you happen to be somebody who is more interested in watching a film for its substance and treatment rather than merely for its starcast, you are compelled willy-nilly to bide your time for the star parade to end and the multiplex near you to come up with something more to your liking.
Worse still, when a small film starts off slowly – which is inevitably the case given the absence of saleable stars in the cast – it isn’t given enough time to find its footing. It is usually out of the scene before the second week begins. Big films, propelled by the stars, make a killing in a single weekend; small films take a while to warm up. ‘Small’ film that have gone to attain varying degrees of success in the past few years–bet it Mr & Mrs Iyer, Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi, Iqbal, Maine Gandhi Ko Nahin Maara or Bheja Fry–have reaped the benefits of an extended run. Patience is the name of the game, but do the multiplexes have faith in that essential attribute of the business.
The multiplexes were expected to empower the audience, especially those who love their cinema to be more than just an evening of fun, give them the privilege of choice, and let them dive into the diversity that Indian cinema is capable of delivering. If that hasn’t happened in its entirety, the time has surely come for the multiplexes to reinvent themselves a bit.
That exercise has probably already got underway. The number of multiplexes around the country is projected to double from the current level of 70-odd to over 150 in the next couple of years. The availability of seats is expected to jump from under 100,000 to 160,000. Interestingly, not all the new multi-screen facilities that are under construction will be of the same kind. They can’t afford to be.
At the current juncture, the multiplex boom remains a fringe phenomenon owing to their exorbitant ticket prices, which, in turn, are necessitated by the high costs of construction in a metropolis. Moreover, low occupancy rates, especially on weekdays, are a major worry. That pushes up ticket prices to make the business viable. Today, even at 35%-40% occupancy, a multiplex can survive. But can the masses survive the ticket price onslaught?
Building a multiplex in a smaller city costs only one-fourth of what it does in Delhi or Mumbai. It is therefore in the smaller cities that the multiplexes will, in the real sense, draw the masses into the incipient revolution. Then, and only then, will the multiplex boom get rolling in right earnest.
So, what does the future hold for the multiplex biz? The days of rundown movie theatres are well and truly over. It is now time for Indian filmmakers to move with the times and abandon their dog-eared ideas for good. Multiplexes were meant to cash in on the fragmentation of the audience. Now the multiplex business, too, needs to embrace genuine multiplicity by splitting into three principal categories. It probably is already doing just that: how else can one explain the recent commercial release of an experimental French anthology film, Paris, je t’aime, which PVR Pictures acquired at the Cannes Film Festival last year?
That sort of thing is increasingly going to become more a necessity than a mere option. The old but refurbished single-screen cinema will continue to proffer big-budget blockbusters, while high-end multiplexes will cater primarily to the discerning among India’s metropolitan moviegoers without really shutting out lovers of conventional entertainment. But much of the action in the next few years will be in the space provided by low-cost, no-frills multi-screen theatres, both in the metros and the small cities.
And that is when quality cinema that flourishes on the fringes today will move centrestage and grab a larger share of the showbiz pie. Can that be bad news for anybody?