Cable சங்கர்

    Doordharshan and Video rights             Until the Government television channel Doordharshan started the service, common public’s only entertainment medium was Cinema Industry’s films. Slowly the scenario changed and Doordharshan gained popularity as the alternate medium. This is when old movies developed demand for them and were being sold at a reasonable price for broadcasting them in TV. During the peak of this era, producers stood in queue for getting applications to sell their films to Doordharshan. All this happened only until satellite channels arrived in the arena.

5.     Lab issues   If there is a single place in existence, which can make or break a movie, it has to be the lab. After the movie production and area sales to appreciable levels, at the time of release major issues would get created and the film would vanish without leaving a trace. Here things can get terrible and make the happenings worse for a producer and push him to the verge of bankruptcy. That is lab for you. Yes, it is that critical.

Distributor / Theater collection calculation and accounting             No matter how the agreement and deals are put in order, accounting of collection lies on statistics of no of tickets in the theater, show-wise price of tickets, etc. To track, collect, record and verify this data, the distributor would send an agent from his side to every theater along with the print. This agent is called ‘Representative’ of the distributor. Representatives are paid salary of Rs.100.00 per day. He also stays in the theater till the movie run ends there. Some big names in distribution arrange the stay for them at nearby lodges too.

Rental Process               As we have discussed already, In Chennai and other big cities, the theaters operate on rental basis. It does not matter whether it is a single screen or multiplex, the theaters operate on rental basis. The rent differs from one theater to another based on factors like locality, capacity and facilities. In Chennai, a moderate theater with AC and DTS can fetch around a lakh rupees as weekly rent. Rent can be split and charged (rent for screening the noon show only). Theaters like Devi have charged INR 2.5 Lakhs as weekly rent. We have paid this amount for ‘Uyirile Kalandhadhu’, which we released in Devibala. The quirky thing to notice in this trade is, the theater owners would deduct the rent for second week when they hand over the first week collection to the distributors. The term this as  ‘Protection Money’, explaining that the producer or distributor need not struggle to pay off the secon...

Screening of a Movie (Exhibition)                                                                Consider this scenario. The producer has completed the film production, declared the release date and also have sold the movie area-wise. There is still work to do for the producer. They include preparing and delivering photo cards for the screening theaters, posters printing, arranging press shows for the reporters and print advertisement among many others. To take a film to the masses and let the public be aware of the movie, Television advertisement and interviews have to be arranged which attract a lot of expense. Films, which are not marketed this way, find it hard to be recognized by the public. Thus in present times, it is imperative to spend a fortune for advertisement.

Film distribution Immediately after the film production is complete, the producer or the production house would be arranging for sales shows for the film. These sales shows are called previews . All-important key distributors would be invited for this preview. The people who watch the movie include distributors and people who are middlemen called mediators. This group determines and fixes the price of the movie based on the cast of the film, technicians’ quality and the previous movies’ success rate of the hero or the director. And to tell you the fact, most of the times, these decisions have gone only wrong!

2.Business of Tamil films             The task is not complete for the producers with last day of shooting or the day when the movie’s editing is completed. It has to be traded. That is where a producer could recover the money he had invested in the making of the movie. As a matter of fact, the difficulties of making a movie are equal to that of trading it. The expenses incurred in the production would equate the expenses incurred by the distributors.

1.     Cinema Industry             Arguments are very common amidst Kollywood fans about the budget of their favorite stars’ movies. They claim sky high the budget and sales figures of the movies to the fans of their conceived opponent heroes. But they do all the boasting without knowing the basic facts like how the movie is sold, how a movie is distributed or even if the movie could collect back the huge amount of funds gone in the making. They don’t cost them anything. Just plain talks! Same time, it is also fact that some shoestring budget movies, which had costed the producer a few crores have surprised the whole K-town with tremendous success and amazing collection.

Preface   Every day, every week, we the public witness a slew of movie releases happening relentlessly in the realms we dwell upon.  In the case of TamilNadu, every week sees the release of at lease three local language (read Tamil) movies, a couple of other language or dubbed movies are releasing. At times, in a single month more than twenty local language movies flurry the cinemas and as fate works out, mostly they fail to leave an impression in the minds of public, bomb at box offices and finds asylum in Television channels to be telecast ‘first time in the TV universe’. Most of the times, these ill-fated movies turn out to be small budget movies. Ironically, only these small budget movies are surviving Tamil film industry albeit in a small way. Few years ago, the whole industry was at the verge of collapse due to the new corporate production homes’ blunders and further fuelled by their bungled modus operandi. Small budget producers give opportunity and life to aspi...

பகுதி 11 ஆம் தமிழ் சினிமா தொலைக்காட்சியின் பின்னே அமிழ்ந்து போயிருக்கக் கூடிய அபாயத்தை காப்பாற்றிய பெருமையில் நிச்சயம் கமலுக்கு பெயர் உண்டுதான்.

பகுதி-8 ஒரு திரையரங்கு வெற்றிகரமாய் நடத்த தொடர்ந்து வெற்றிப்படங்களை, பெரிய நடிகர்கள் நடித்த படங்களை வெளியிட வேண்டும். அப்படி வெளியிடும் போது அந்த தியேட்டருக்கென்று ஒரு தனி மரியாதை மக்களிடையே ஏற்படும். தொடர்ந்து வெற்றிப் படங்களை போட்டால்தான் தியேட்டருக்கும் லாபம்.