Spoilers Ahead by Rajeev Masand: A 5-step guide for Bollywood to fix itself
It isn’t the boycotts and the films from the South that are hurting India’s favourite film industry. It’s the industry itself
It’s hardly a secret that Bollywood is going through a rough patch currently. From boycotts being called on every second movie, and the dominance of South films at the all-India box-office, to the tectonic shift in the audience’s entertainment consumption habits, it just feels as if the Hindi film industry can’t catch a break.
Bollywood has called this upon itself. Coming out of a pandemic, it was hardly prudent to expect that things would go back to exactly the way they were. Blame it on misguided hubris or a shocking lack of foresight, but the point is—there was no plan in place to deal with or embrace change.
Still, those writing obituaries of Bollywood may be jumping the gun. Things may be bad, but it’s nothing the business can’t come back from. It’s also not the first time they’re ringing the death knell for the Hindi film industry. Back in the day, the advent of video, the menace of piracy, the threat of the underworld, and a global recession had each led to widespread fear that Bollywood, and specifically the theatrical film business, was nearing its end. But Bollywood always bounced back. As it will, again.
To speed up its recovery, here are five things that the Hindi film industry needs to implement…
Improve the theatrical experience
Cinema ticket prices were exorbitant even pre-Covid but it was foolish to think that the middle class would be comfortable splurging 300 bucks on popcorn and 400 bucks on a movie ticket after a pandemic.
If you want viewers to come to the cinemas, make it worth their while. Reduce ticket prices, go back to the days of cheaper snacks, and cut down the 25 minutes or so of ads before the main feature. Just commit to making a trip to the movies fun again.
Also, if a ticket to watch Jhund is priced the same as a ticket for Jug Jugg Jeeyo, it’s a sure-fire way of deterring the audience from taking a chance on films with an artistic bent.
Don’t think of streaming as the enemy
The fatal folly of shrinking the theatrical window post-pandemic may have done the maximum damage to the cinema business. After two years of getting accustomed to films coming to you instead of going out to watch films, why didn’t anyone predict that our cost, time and convenience-conscious population might be happier waiting (only) two weeks to watch the latest Bollywood offering at home on Amazon Prime or Hotstar? That mistake has been corrected now that distributors and exhibitors have agreed to keep an eight-week window between the theatrical and streaming release of Hindi films.
Yet it may be myopic to think of streaming as the enemy. In the West, if it weren’t for Netflix forking out $200 million, Martin Scorsese probably couldn’t have made The Irishman. Closer home, streaming has given amazing opportunities to actors like Shefali Shah (Delhi Crime), Jaideep Ahlawat (Paatal Lok), and Pankaj Tripathi (Mirzapur) to amass a loyal audience that can be counted on to show up each time they make a theatrical movie.
Slash bloated star fees
The industry earlier felt that a movie star’s fee ought to be commensurate with the opening day collections he could notch up. That sent the acting fees of A-listers like Akshay Kumar, Shahid Kapoor, Ranveer Singh, Varun Dhawan and Tiger Shroff to stratospheric heights. But every single one of those leading men have failed to hit the same opening numbers in a post-pandemic landscape, making it hard to justify the salary they’ve been commanding.
A course correction is already underway, but not without much kicking and screaming from actors and their agents.
Don’t be fooled by Twitter trends
Brainwashed into believing that Bollywood is a snake pit full of ruthless, amoral folks who take drugs, sleep around and gang up on outsiders, a sizeable chunk of Indians have clearly become cynical about the same industry that once gave them so much pleasure. Manipulated by disgruntled film people themselves, or shrill attention-seeking TV news anchors, these misguided activists may succeed in making #BoycottBollywood hashtags trend, but don’t have the clout to pull down a good film. Twitter trends are fickle and can be bought. But Bollywood knows that already—from all the false (and paid) hype they drum up around their latest films.
Make better films
Let’s be honest—most of the films that haven’t worked were derivative, lazy, old-fashioned, or just plain bad. Given that a large chunk of the audience was exposed to a smorgasbord of quality shows and films on streaming platforms during the pandemic, it’s not surprising that tastes and thresholds for patience have changed.
It’s also convenient to blame South films for the sad state of the Hindi film industry. The makers of Pushpa, RRR and KGF: Chapter 2 know their audience, and made those films with the sort of conviction that has sadly gone missing from the masala movies of Bollywood. But for every Telugu or Tamil film that has broken out, there are four others that have failed. Much like Bollywood.
The only reality is that we’ve become a complacent industry. The success of remakes and franchises over the last few years have killed our appetite for taking risks. Bollywood will not grow until it aspires to tell better, original and game-changing stories.
Formerly a film journalist, Rajeev Masand currently heads a talent management agency in Mumbai
Spoilers Ahead is a new fortnightly column for, by and of lovers of films and film stars. Catch the next column on September 17, 2022.
From HT Brunch, September 3, 2022
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