Yesterday, we spoke about how, in the case of the last few big films (especially the ones released in the past couple of years) there have been fingers pointed at the authenticity of the collections that were being declared on full page ads. While quite a few prominent film industry insiders spoke about things that are currently going wrong when it comes to box office fudging, here’s a look at what others have to say in this second and concluding part of the feature.
Says prominent distributor Rajesh Thadani, “Producers should in fact give real figures so that everyone knows the real picture. There has to be a collective effort from all so that the new entrants are not taken for a ride by these figures.”
The inherent message is for the producers to keep their stand clear and report only what is correct. Though it is easier said than done, that appears to be the way out for most.
The youngsters in the business, who are much more aware about the business of films due to the availability of instant information, are ready to catch the evil by its neck.
Says Harsh Jain, film distributor and exhibitor, Sanman Group:
As a person from the trade I even wrote an article about manipulating numbers sometime ago after a big film’s collections were fudged with no limits. This then created a storm within the trade and it went viral on the Internet and overnight my Twitter handle was flooded with the comments of people from all over the world. While they praised the article, they also laughed on the people involved in such acts.
It is no breaking news that he is talking about Krrish 3, the (varied) collections of which belong to the folklore.
Another youngster in the field, Akshaye Rathi, film exhibitor & distributor, says:
For the sake of a financially stable future of the industry, we need to ensure transparency at every level, right from the exhibition sector, to the distributors and ultimately when the producers or studios report it. The most authentic way to ensure that is to have a system like Rentrak operational across the distribution networks.
While one waits to see that eventually happening, it may still be about time to adopt some uniformity. Veterans in the business wonder, though, if eventually anyone is gaining out of the current scenario.
Says Ananth Mahadevan:
I sometimes wonder what the justification for losses would be when the IT officials go by these figures? May be they are told that inflation is a necessary publicity stunt to keep the stocks from crashing. I would like to hear these conversations.
We too!