MADology

Anybody watching?

FEW TAKERS:
Cinema halls are trying their best to bring in the crowds, but in vain

 THE World Cup makes everyone smile barring the cinema hall owners. With the World Cup fever gripping the nation, multiplexes as well as single screen theatres are having a tough time attracting movie goers to the halls. This month has been a dud at the box office as the collection has been minimal, to say the least. To beat the heat of the situation, cinema are implementing innovative business strategies as they do not want their revenues to be affected badly. The ongoing examinations and the World Cup has resulted in the release of very few small budget Hindi movies. To bring in the crowd, Abhay Anant Bhalerao, unit manager at Fame, has recently started a Marathi Film Festival at his multiplex. He says, “We are screening blockbuster Marathi movies like Ideachi Kalpana, Harishchandrachi Factory and Zhenda among others. This is attracting a lot of family crowd. Though it’s been just two days so far we are getting a positive response.” Planning along similar lines, Esquare will have a Marathi Dhamaal Week. Suraj Sharma, manageroperations, says, “We will screen hit movies like Mi Shivaji Raje Bhonsle Boltoy and many others. Although we are continuing with the Bollywood movies that released earlier and the Oscar winning movies, we plan to screen these movies for the audience. It’s not a business plan as it will only increase our revenue by 10 per cent. Overall, the business has gone down by almost 50 per cent due to the exams and the World Cup,” he tells us. 

Inox plans to blunt the impact of the World Cup and exams with eclectic content. It is screening the hit films of the three Khans, Aamir, Salman and SRK. A source from the multiplex says, “The movies — Dabangg, Ghajini, Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi and 3 Idiots — have been box office hits. So, we are bringing these films back to the silver screen. It is helping the revenue and also covering up for the lack of film releases this month.” Theatre owners are also resorting to reducing the ticket prices to attract more cinema lovers to the halls. Sandeep Shetty, cinema manager at Big Cinemas feels that they are helpless. He says, “There is nothing much we can do, since there are no releases this month. We are relying on the H o l ly wo o d flicks, which are now d o i n g reasonably well. Also, we have priced the tickets at a flat 100, which is increasing the footfalls.” City Pride too has reduced the cost of the tickets but in vain. Shailesh Joshi, programming manager, says, “Even after reducing the prices of the tickets, the response has been dull. The halls see only 50 per cent occupancy these days. That comes down to 30 per cent when India plays,” he adds.

Atamaram Jaswani, General Manager of Mangala says, “The occupancy has gone down badly. Only 15 per cent of the hall is full, forcing us to reduce the number of shows.” The cinema hall has reduced the number of film screenings from six to four. Suresh Talera, owner of Bollywood Kharadi says that no formula is nullifying the cricket fever. He says, “We have tried many game plans but nothing has worked. Reduction of cost, offering discount coupons for bulk bookings and screening hit films have not given any positive results.”
Plans are many, but the results leave a lot to be desired.