Beating OTTs with multiplex rates?

Not that therersquos much documentation of Bollywood from the rsquo80s which is why I vaguely remember a documentary from then canrsquot find the entire thing on YouTube that travels to various Bollywood sets with Amitabh Bachchan and his directors Mukul Anand Tinnu Anand Manmohan Desai for voices of authorityWhat do I recall A little child who visits I think the shoot of a film called Toofan 1989 where Bachchan keeps urging the kid to watch his film with family when it opens in cinemas ldquoNo no watch it in theatres okayrdquoWhat had happened in the rsquo80s Desi upper middleclass had pretty much stalled watching Bollywood films in cinemas They preferred to watch the same movie a few weeksmonths later when it came on video tapes You could rent these from the local library at a nominal R10R20 a night Which means Bollywood producers practically earned nothing from itTelevision albeit with a single channel was a new thing too And this is also where a lot of good Bombay filmmakers showcased their works through TV series that everybody loved There was a fair bit of Hindi arthouse cinema at videorentals tooCinema box office progressively belonged to the lsquomassesrsquo as against uppermiddle lsquoclassesrsquo Ticket rates were cheap which means many cinemas stank as wellmdashthere was hardly any money for the upkeepThe breadbutter assembly line of moviesmdasha lot of them remakes from the South so many of them starring Jeetendra much else being random action overthetop obsessive madnessmdashappealed to formulaic popular tastes Irsquom talking about four decades before yoursquore reading this Meaning the same timegap as between the two world wars and the rsquo80s itself to give you perspectiveWhat brought the desi middle class back into theatres Primarily in the rsquo90s a string of lsquofamily entertainersrsquomdashthat also encouraged theatre owners to spruce up their lobbiesbalconies charge a range of ticket rates Liberty Cinema in Mumbai with Hum Aapke Hain Koun 1993 for instance was a big move in that directionMore so it was the advent of multiplexes in the early 2000s that started a split in theatrical audiences againmdashbetween lsquomassesrsquo patrons of cheaper seatspopcorn at singlescreen cinemas still and the lsquoclassesrsquo that went to watch lsquomultiplex filmsrsquo showing at multiple audis offering greater choice simultaneously Bheja Fry 2007 for example was a lsquomultiplex hitrsquoBy the mid2000s yoursquod hear of several singlescreen cinemas shutting down Bulk of BO revenues came from multiplexes Even then everyone spoke about how merely 10 per cent films worked in a yearmdashthatrsquos a bizarre rate of return for investors to stick around for longOnly by the end of the decade the film salestradeindustry folk figured that the lsquoclassesrsquo were probably seeking the same entertainment as the lsquomassesrsquo Or at least there was economic sense in ideally placing all bets on one release carpetbombing prints into multiplexes and singlescreens acrossmdashcreate enough hype pack in people and scoot A lot of corporate firms international included had entered film production Global recession couldrsquove inspired that moveThe staractor was supposed to guarantee crowds on Day One This is when BO of Bollywood films got counted basis opening weekweekend collections Also the lsquo100 crorersquo club was bornmdash Aamir Khanrsquos rapid actioner Ghajini 2008 was first Thatrsquos effectively a crore people walking in for a movie to hit the big benchmarkThese records were getting broken repeatedly Also films that one didnrsquot classify as lsquo100 crorersquo type before ones with much lower budgets began to enter the big league until 2019mdashwhen multiplexes were showing phenomenal profitsWhat changed The 2020 pandemic How did audiences react to it By fully embracing content on OTT which are essentially video libraries plus TV on one platform that also directly creates software for it given adequate revenues from minimal monthly subscription feesThis is also the liberating ecosystem some of Bombayrsquos best filmmakers migrated to Practically everyone from the uppermiddle class demographic I meet tells me theyrsquoll ldquocatch it when it comes on OTTrdquo when I tell them about a film in a theatre I loved Itrsquos not about whether theyrsquoll like the film equally Theyrsquove not seen it No question of lsquoword of mouthrsquo thenCinema viewing is also a habit Something was broken How did the film tradesalesindustrymultiplex side react to a postpandemic world Continuing with the same model Assuming nothing had happenedmdashhiking up all prices even further while peoplersquos incomes have fallenThey gave reasons for why Bollywood films were bombing in turnmdashstar fees films not rooted enough mood of nation return of lsquoangry young manrsquo lack of spectacle not enough mad action etc etcContrasting it was around threefour films from down South that did well nationally regardlessmdashwhich is actually a great thing only not enough for cinemas to return as a consumption culture or inspire bigger investments in BombayAre we back to the 1980s The reverse if not worse actually The middle lsquoclassesrsquo are now on subscriptionbased OTTs even for films it used to be mainly with series beforemdashthis is hopefully a phase The lsquomassesrsquo on the other hand are equally glued to cell phones cheap data and canrsquot afford multiplexes which has turned the same volumebased movie industry into an ultraluxury fivestar hotel product So whatrsquos the point thenMayank Shekhar attempts to make sense of mass culture He tweets mayankw14Send your feedback to mailbagmiddaycomThe views expressed in this column are the individualrsquos and donrsquot represent those of the paper