Multiplex (different) cinema is more formula driven and cliche

Couple of years back everybody was excited that multiplex cinema had changed the rules of the game and generated fresher content. Trade experts thought that it would keep dominating over single screens. But the success of 'Ghajini' followed by 'Wanted', 'Dabangg' and now 'Yamla Pagla Deewana' broke the mirage of 'multiplex - mania'.

This success of masala ventures has established the fact that nothing succeeds like entertaining film and people still love it. Poor production values, repetitive storyline, steep prices of tickets and uninspired starcast contributed to the downfall of multiplex wave. Audience has full right to expect good locales and big starcast when one is shelling out 200 to 300 rupees for single watch especially when content is poor, niche and formula driven.

In the beginning, everything looked promising when series of fresh multiplex hits came out i.e. 'Bheja Fry', 'Khosla Ka Ghosla', 'Dev D' and 'Pyar Ke Side Effects'. But soon makers of this genre started taking audience for granted. For example,Rajat Kapoor, Vinay Phatak and Ranvir Shrenoy delivered hits like 'Bheja Fry', 'Dasvidaniya' and 'Khosla Ka Ghosla' but on contrary they produced duds like 'Straight', 'Raat Gayi Baat Gayi', 'Emotional Atychaar-The Film' and 'Straight'.

So many films came with lot of critical acclaim but failed to ignite box office as well as audience. 'City Of Gold', 'Barah Aana' (poster screamed that Aamir Khanl oved the film but he proved to be the only one), 'Sankat City' and 'Chintu Ji' are few examples of that. The poor content was the main culprit behind this disaster. Now it is crystal clear that size of budget is immaterial but content is what audience is running after.

And there is one more myth established by media and there is good chunk of audience who are following it. The myth is that only small budget or art films have content and films with big budget and star power are repetitive. But this argument does not hold any water. Good content means that the promise shown by promo or star should be fulfilled in those 2-3 hours of screening. For example, 'Yamla Pagala Deewana', 'Dabangg' and 'My Name Is Khan' were hot since the launch of its first promo and went on to become a super hit because audience got what they were promised and on the contrary in the case of 'TMK', audience felt cheated as there was nothing beyond 'Jawani of Sheila'. 'Band Baaja Baraat' and 'Do Dooni Chaar' did business beyond expectations due to middle class feel and natural dialogues not because content was out of the world. What was even more interesting that most of the hits of last couple of years had done better business in single screen than multiplex so this can be seen as the sign of revival of 'pure' bollywood cinema and single screens.

In short, 'fake' urban and multiplex cinema is biting the dust and originality and freshness of content is the sure winner at box office and yes, genre and target audience should be clear.

DEMOCRATIZATION OF BOLLYWOOD-secret behind success of WANTED & DABANGG

2008 had WANTED as surprise hit and 2009 saw DABANGG raking all the moolah.This phenomenon has totally changed the face of box office and fate of stars upside down. Salman Khan has certainly become 'the' hot property and five projects (READY,BODYGUARD,KICK,WANTED-2 &Partner-2) starring him are currently under production with almost similar mass appeal as DABANGG had. Now even Shahrukh is coming up with two action oriented projects next year,Ra.One releasing in June and DON-2 on 23rd December.Aamir has just signed his next a thriller to be directed by Reema Kangti (who directed Honeymoon Travels Pvt. Ltd.).Almost all stars are moving towards action oriented storyline and social or urban or multiplex themes have become suddenly extinct.


There is a sound reason behind this sudden shift of taste of consumer.Let's go back to 2001 when 1st phase of multiplex revolution happened.Multiplexes were opening up in every metros and by 2007 multiplexes acquired fair share of box office in mini-metros(Kanpur,Indore,Surat, Ahmadabad etc) too. Now next phase of growth for multiplexes was from smaller towns and mini-metros. Going by the revenue collection figures,65 percent of total collection comes from small towns & tier-2 cities.Multiplexes opened in cities like Raipur,Ludhiana,Lucknow,Moradabad,Nasik,Aurangabad,Amritsar.AND THIS CHANGED THE EQUATION OF SUCCESS OF BOLLYWOOD.


Suddenly in 2008,all top 3 grosser(GHAJINI,RAB NE BANA DI JODI & SINGH IS KINNG)were hard core masala ventures;almost in contrast of hits(CHAK DE INDIA & TAARE ZAMEEN PAR) of 2007.This trend got consolidated in 2009 with the success of WANTED which was a huge surprise hit after a long time(last surprise hit was GADAR in 2001 almost a decade back!).Now success of DABANGG  & ONCE UPON A TIME IN MUMBAI in 2010 has stamped the power of 'ordinary audience'(who enjoys movies for solely for entertainment not like multiplex audience where agenda driven or fake intellectual movies are liked).Where from 2001 to 2007 saw at least 3 to 4 multiplex hits(KHOSLA KA GHOSLA,AAMIR,BHEJA FRY,PYAR KE SIDE EFFECTS,PAGE3) every year, this trend started diminishing from 2008.



This phenomenon is democratization of bollywood which has it's share of pros & cons.On the one hand,we are getting full on dose of same old bollywood masala entertainment(DABANGG has striking similarities with Dharmendra's PRATIGYA) but on the contrary it is boosting revenue streams of box office which had gone dry since the advent of multiplexes.So next time if you shake your head in utter disbelief that how come 'this' movie earned so much remember there will be lakhs of audiences in hinterland of country clapping and whistling on song dance and drama TYPICAL BOLLYWOOD ISHTYLE.