How the recent hits have shown theatres the joy of staying single

Blockbusters like 'Pathan', 'Gadar 2', and 'Jawaan' have revitalized single screen theaters in India, proving that there is still an audience for massy, action-packed films.

MUMBAI Not too long ago, filmmakers and producers of the Hindi film industry were known to huddle into meeting rooms to strategize about ways to reverse the downturn that had gripped Bollywood in the aftermath of the pandemic and the surge in popularity of OTT platforms. And then blockbusters like ‘Pathan’, ‘Gadar 2’ and ‘Jawaan’ re-wrote the narrative. Quietly alongside, the films have also infused a shot of life into single screen theatres, across the country, which were on the verge of being relegated to the archives.

How the recent hits have shown theatres the joy of staying single

Arijit Dutta, owner of Kolkata’s iconic Priya Cinema, is ecstatic with the turnaround. He says, he and others of his ilk managed to “show our strength this year with a handful of mass entertainers, bringing in 50 per cent of the cumulative business”. Dutta blames the demise of single screens -- down to just over a 100 from 900 in West Bengal -- on the focus on “multiplex films” and hopes that recent blockbusters like ‘Pathan’, ‘Gadar 2’ and ‘Jawaan’, which appealed to a wide audience, will open the eyes of producers, directors and distributors to the fact that it still pays to cater to the entire diaspora rather than 5 per cent of the high-income populace. “With the right kind of films, we can still flex our muscles,” Dutta promises.

Suman Sinha, the owner of Patna’s Regent Cinema, agrees, pointing to the overwhelming success of films like ‘KGF: Chapter 2’, ‘RRR’, ‘Pushpa’ and ‘Kantara’ even through the Covid-19 pandemic – it proved that there is always an audience for massy, action-packed films. In fact, such films have kept the single screens in business in the South, while the absence of crowd-pleasing content has strangled Bollywood. “‘Gadar 2’ enjoyed an excellent four-week run in our 652-seater theatre. With five housefull shows, we were drawing 4000 moviegoers to Regent which is four times the capacity of any multiplex,” Sinha says proudly.

Sunny Deol’s cross-border action drama also enjoyed a triumphant four-week reign at Jaipur’s 1,145-seater Gem Cinema. Its owner, Sudhir Kasliwal, insists Shah Rukh Khan’s spy thriller ‘Pathan’ too would have enjoyed a longer run had it not been for miscreants vandalising the premises, resulting in the film being taken down prematurely. While acknowledging that Shah Rukh Khan and Salman Khan are still huge draws, the veteran exhibitor rues that SRK’s ‘Jawan’ ran out of steam within a week, attributing this to the mushrooming of theatres in the Pink City.

Vintage glam

Back in 1964, when Gem opened its doors on July 4 with AVM Pictures’s ‘Pooja Ke Phool’, it was only the sixth theatre Jaipur. With 1245 seats, including 300 in Balcony and a 20-seater Box, late jeweller LK Kasliwal’s passion project, which took four years to build, was not just the largest theatre in Rajasthan, but only the second with 70 mm screening, after Delhi’s Sheila cinema. “We were also the only theatre in Jaipur back then showing English films in Sunday morning shows, our state-of-art Todd-AO stereo magnetic system and 70 mm cinemascope projectors enhancing the magic of musicals like ‘The Sound of Music’. Soon, because of public demand, we had to add an extra show on Thursday evening,” informs Kasliwal.

Flashbacking to when films like ‘Arzoo’, ‘Aradhana’ and ‘Muqaddar Ka Sikander’ celebrated silver and golden jubilees at the family theatre with their filmmakers and actors, he shares, “Would you believe, we were taken to court by the distributors because my father had forcibly removed ‘Muqaddar Ka Sikander’ after 45 weeks to accommodate a new release at Gem rather than indulge moviegoers who dropped by just to watch Rekha dance to a “Salaam-e-Isq meri jaan”?”

Gem’s glory days ended with the advent of multiplexes and it downed shutters in 2005. In 2019, it re-opened briefly to screen ‘Mughal-E-Azam’ during the Jaipur International Film Festival. On the occasion, octogenarian projectionist Bhawani Singh was called to load the German reel projector he had operated for years. In the digital age, the cinema’s two well-preserved 70 mm projectors, and a couple of 35mm projectors, haven’t been pressed into service since. But Kasliwal, as a tribute to his entrepreneur father, has restored the theatre without any structural changes to its art-deco façade.

Today, Gem is a tourist attraction with The Jaipur Virasat Foundation bringing youngsters who have never seen such a large auditorium with a foyer that can host art exhibitions and a lawn in front, for heritage walks through it. In 2021, with ‘Sooryavanshi’, Kasliwal also started screening films at the family theatre again. Two years later, he had the satisfaction of seeing ‘Gadar 2’ draw full houses.

The economics

According to an Ormax Media report, with a gross box-office of ₹10,637 crore, 2022 was just about ₹ 300 crore behind 2019, which remains the best-grossing year at the Indian box-office. However, compared to 2019, the Hindi box-office lost 33 to 44 per cent to South Indian languages, Telugu being the biggest gainer. In fact, 32 per cent of the Hindi box-office came from the dubbed versions of ‘KGF: Chapter 2’, ‘Pushpa’, ‘RRR’, ‘Kantara’ etc, with ‘KGF: Chapter 2’, ‘RRR’ and ‘Avatar’ emerging as the year’s top three films last year.

In less than nine months, the picture has changed. ‘Pathan’, ‘Gadar 2’ and ‘Jawan’, along with ‘The Kerala Story’, ‘OMG2’, ‘Adipurish’, ‘Fukrey 3’ and the Hindi dubbed versions of ‘Jailer’, ‘Varisu’, ‘Ponniyin Selvan—PS2’ and ‘Waltair Veerayya’, have taken the Hindi box-office share up to 42 per cent. Akkshay Rathie, director of Ashirwad Theatres Pvt, Ltd., believes that with footfalls increasing by 20-30 per cent, and ‘Tiger 3’, ‘Animal’ and ‘Dunki’ coming with the promise of big returns, 2023 could well turn out to be a historic year for Hindi cinema in terms of turnover.

Reiterating that the biz has become more democratic and there is a need for films that work across multiplexes and single screens, in Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3 cities, Rathie sees “cross-pollination of talent” as a way to capture new markets. He observes that after the successful teaming of Rajnikanth and Akshay Kumar in ‘2.0’ in 2018, and Ram Charan, Jr. NTR, Ajay Devgn and Alia Bhatt in ‘RRR’ in 2022, ‘Jawaan’ in 2023, with a director, Atlee, and two superstars, Vijay Sethupathi and Nayanthara, from the South, collaborating with Bollywood biggies Shah Rukh Khan and Deepika Padukone, was able to make significant inroads into the Tamil market. “The trend will peak with ‘War 2’ which brings together two superstars, Hrithik Roshan and Jr. NTR, from two different film industries. I’m expecting it to become the highest grossing Hindi film,” says Rathie.

However, for greater stability, the exhibitor-distributor believes that along with the big ticket, tentpole films which earn the industry ₹400- ₹500 crore, Hindi cinema also needs the ₹80- ₹100 crore Ayushmann Khurranas and Rajkummar Rao hits, ‘concept’ films like ‘Kashmir Files’, ‘The Kerala Story’ and ‘Satyaprem Ki Katha’, Hollywood and language films, even restored and re-released classics to ensure that theatres never fall short of content through 52 weeks of the year. “There’s an audience for any film, the price just has to be right,” Rathie asserts.

Bringing back viewers

National Cinema Day which was observed on September 23, last year, on October 13 this year, is a multiplex initiative aimed to bring people back to the theatres. With ticket prices brought down to ₹ 99, almost all film shows have drawn full houses. Admission rates at most single screens, air-conditioned or not, in cities or small towns, usually range between ₹100- ₹200 through the year. So, apart from size, affordability is another advantage single screen theatres have over multiplexes.

Kasliwal informs that even today at Gem, tickets are priced at ₹150 for ‘Lower Class’, ₹ 200 for ‘Balcony’ and ₹250 for ‘Box’. So, a family of four can enjoy a film, with a ₹30 samosa and a ₹50 popcorn tub.

Dutta points out that with even though multiplexes have been dictating terms and ensuring that single screen can’t open advance booking before them and on occasions, have to queue up after them, single screens have an edge over them – they don’t pay rent and CAM (Common Area Maintenance) or maintain a staff of 60. “The day all single screen owners across the country unite and price tickets at ₹60-75 flat for lower stalls and ₹150 for balcony seats, multiplexes will have no audience left,” he prophesies.

A few years ago, the Bengal exhibitor, anguished by certain decisions that lead to Priya Cinema suspending operations for no fault of his, had moved to the hospitality sector. Eventually, his family’s passion for cinema got him and Priya back in business. However, elsewhere in the country, owners of many single screens in prime locations have accepted tempting offers from real estate developers and their theatres have been demolished to make way for malls, hotels and even hospitals.

Rashmikant Bhalodia, director of Galaxy Cinema (Rajkot) Private Limited (GCRPL), despite upgrading his five theatres for over 50 years and paying his staff full salary for a year through months of lockdown, has sold his Galaxy theatres in Bhavnagar and Jamnagar, along with Anupam and Amber in Ahmedabad. Even the 52-year-old 689-seater Galaxy theatre in Rajkot, the first in Saurashtra with a high resolution 70-mm projector, has been shut down for repairs since August 4, 2022. The 76-year-old veteran has left it to the next generation to decide how they want to rebuild their numero uno theatre, admitting that maintaining a 70-feet screen and a 600-seater theatre is no longer commercially viable despite the fact that saturated with OTT platforms, people are venturing out again.

“After deducting state, central and municipal taxes, distributor’s share (50 per cent or theatre hire unlike multiplexes), maintenance, staff salaries, high electricity bills and licence renewal fees, we are left with very little which explains why the number of single screen theatres are down from around 7,000 in 2019 to 5,500 today,” Bhalodia sighs. According to him, the only way single screens can survive is if the government, taking a cue from China where screens have increased from 5,000 to 40,000 in just five years, exempt new cinemas from paying taxes for 10 years, cut admission rates so that films can compete with TV, OTT and other entertainment providers, and stop piracy. “Instead of spending crores on film cities, they should spend on film theatres. That will give us a leg to stand on,” he sums up.