Hindi cinema has now been in a crisis for years. But for sporadic hits, box-office income has been severely depleted, and critical appreciation even more so.
“Experts” across spectrum, usually self-styled, have cast judgments on the causes and ongoing factors that are responsible, and if such speculations are not all wrong, they are not all right either.
But the industry must get its act together. In the last three parts on this issue, I have examined the key reasons that are basic and logical. Moving on, let us look at one more key reason: Star prices and budgets.
Since time immemorial, hits and flops had a simple Math. If the money invested in a film by its distributors (who bought the film from the producer) was Rs. 10, which included publicity and advertising, a film that recovered less was a flop, a film that made Rs. 11-20 was a moderate success, Rs. 20 up was a “hit”, Rs. 30 onwards “was a super-hit” and Rs. 40 upwards was a “blockbuster”.
In other words, it was a simple “Return on Investment” data and the profit percentage decided the status. But this cardinal issue (which is what made the 1975 Jai Santoshi Maa a bigger hit than Deewaar and an Ek Duuje Ke Liyescore higher in 1981 than Kranti, Naseeb, Laawaris and Love Story) was jettisoned from 2004 when big-ticket films Main Hoon Na and Veer-Zaara were rated higher than the modestly-budgeted and star-less film that was the actual biggest hit, Murder (on ROI basis).
The corporate era made things even more complicated. Egos and prestige became bigger. Corporates largely understood money, not creativity. Many were not satisfied with financing films, and even officially produced them. Satellite, world, in-film advertising, music, video and later streaming rights came in and finally, a film could even make a whopping amount from these.
Thus, for example, a film whose final price-tag (cost) was Rs. 50 crore, could recover that and more extra-theatrically even if the film was a disaster at the b-o. and made barely a few crore. Om Shanti Om (2007) was the biggest hit of 2007 by box-office ratings. But Eros International, which bought the film from Red Chillies Entertainment for a huge Rs. 72 crore, could make less than Rs. 10 crore as profit! On the classic parameter, it was thus just a “commission earner” for Eros. Similarly, many biggies had an unstable math, but the actual collections were given importance and the films declared hits (or even higher) when investors had actually lost money!
And yet, a constant feature that emerged was a film’s cost as in three-digit figures (that is, 125 crore, for example) that actually made ROI safety unfeasible. Indian films’ markets, despite the global spread, cannot be compared to Hollywood’s. And now came the nub.
A star (or more) corners a whopping share of the budget of a movie. This compromised everything else—the spends on writing, technical excellence and music. Add the resultant downslide in quality and we were on a disaster spree. Yes, many a star does take a share in the profit now, but even that amount, as per the contracts, is usually disproportionately high.
The worst part is not even that: apart from some heroines demanding (but mostly not getting!) amounts matching the male stars when they cannot guarantee support from fans for their films’ fates, we even have non-star male actors demanding (and getting) disproportionate amounts as fees! Names like Manoj Bajpayee and Nawazuddin Siddiqui are said to be asking for double-digit crores as fees when the overwhelming numbers of their movies have a lifetime collection (not profit!) of far less than 10 crore!! And mind you, these arty actors are among the foremost in running down the star system and the “commercial outlook” of mainstream cinema!
A film’s viewer potential must decide the budget, not any other factor. And that is also why so many filmmakers take the OTT release route.
But that is not what entertainment means for people who want a collective movie-watching experience. And so, correction in star prices and budgets must be implemented.
In the next and final installment in this series, we will look at the lack of music to attract the audience.
(Used with permission)
