For Indian Cinema 2022 is gonna be a case study as this year marks the end of mediocrity & the rise of true blue cinema
Remember the early 2010s, when only big cinematic spectacles grossed big numbers and some mid budget good films gained a respectable total? Big screen popcorn entertainers like Krishh 3, Dhoom 3. etc. were all big successes. Then suddenly came a time where the social topics based films gained huge numbers like Dangal and plenty of Akshay Kumar & Ayushmaan Khurrana films. Suddenly there was a rise of such films in the name of Pink, Badhaai Ho .etc. and theatrical experience which the audience direly needed in the form of some big screen popcorn entertainers went missing and even if they came the results were something atrocious ones like Thugs of Hindostan, Race 3, Happy New Year, Kalank .etc.
And this was the point when the South Industry took it's step in the Big Player's Game, The North Belt! Before 10 July 2015, if I had told you that a dubbed South movie starring a bunch of unknown actors would make even 20 crores of revenue, then you would be calling me mad. Jump to 2022, where an unknown hero and newcomer Nikhil Siddharta's film Kartikeya 2 did a business of 25 crores in the hindi language.
When you leave the meat in the open and don't look after it then it's obvious that someone else will grab that piece of meat & start start eating it. Same thing happened with the hindi film industry which started to make the same repetitive content in the name of social films that after a point of time their movies only appealed only to the higher niche audience of multiplex. And then SS Rajamouli came with a revolution in the name of Bahubali whose first part not only did a 100 crores business in hindi language that too against a bigger movie Bajrangi Bhaijaan (which released one week after Bahubali the beginning), but the sequel went on to do something unthinkable. It grossed more than 500 crores in domestic collections only in the hindi language. And then some wannabe Bahubalis came in the form of Mohenjodaro, Shamshera, Thugs of Hindostan .etc. only to bite the dust.
The South film makers got the formula for bringing the audience to the theatres and Kannada cinema was the 2nd industry to take the cake by giving the KGF franchise to the audience, whose 2nd installment again amassed a whopping 400 crores. This was followed by the Tamil industry by giving movies like Vikram and PS1 (2.0 wouldn't be counted as it had a face value as big as Akshay Kumar for the Pan India Audience). Although these movies weren't big successes in hindi, they have gathered a very much loyal audience for themselves and that might be benefit their upcoming sequels. 777 Charlie was another movie that went unnoticed by the theatre going audience in the North but was talked over later. Kantara is the classic example of word of mouth doing wonders, without being a sequel, without being an action genre film or a without having huge budget, only with it's content the movie which merely opened at 1 crore, did lifetime collection of nearly 80 crores, which is by the way let me tell more than some event disaster films of bollywood like Samraat Prithviraj, Laal Singh Chaddha, Vikram Vedha .etc.
The Problem
The movies were back in Diwali 2021 after a long lockdown (they were opened once in early 2021,but that wasn't of much benefit as 2nd wave got too hard) with the release of Sooryavanshi which did almost 200 crores nett business in 50% occupancy back then. However duds after duds came thereafter, until Christmas season of 2021, with Spiderman No way home and Pushpa The Rise. 83, to which everyone had pinned their high hopes on, turned out to be one of the biggest box office disasters ever for bollywood as frankly speaking the movie had nothing for which any random person in a weekend will go to see in a theatre whenalternatives such as Spiderman & Pushpa are available (both are proper mass commercial entertainers). There's a certain section of people which started a new debate "The audience doesn't deserve good cinema". Who are these legends? Where do they come from? Bandra? Andheri West? The audience only deserves the worth of their bucks which they spend to watch the movie for 3 hours. If Sooryavanshi gives them that worth then what's the problem? If RRR gives them that worth, what's the problem? If Avatar 2 gives them that worth, what's the problem? These are the same people who take 2-3 years to make a medicore piece of art and when that crap doesn't excite the audience then the victim card play starts like there recently a trend was there for a pukeworthy movie Shamshera, the trend was #ShamsheraIsOurs
Spending more time and budget in developing a better script, writing better characters, casting better actors would yield a more fruitful results, instead of spending the producer's resources & PR activities for all such Bull. This only detoriates the reputation of all involved in the movie rather than doing some damage control. Also, the directors of such movies have developed an attitude as if directors like Kubrick & Scorsese are their inferior contemporaries. Director of 83 Kabir Khan gave a statement that "I don't care about the Box Office, I know I have made a good film and I am proud of it" Well, if your movie had minimal losses then giving such arrogant statements won't be an issue but it is, when your movie had generated a loss of more than 150 crores. In the name of good cinema, mediocrity was being served and let me ask one more thing that if your movie was such a Oscar winning piece of art, then why even the section of audience for whom that movie is made also even they rejected it? Because even when you don't have the support of mass audiences, there can be wins like Drishyam 2 & The Kashmir Files (however The Kashmir Files success is a debatable topic as any normal movie will not have lakhs of tickets being sponsored by the ruling political party of the country, for continuous 15 days and that too during peak state elections time). The so-called "GOOD CINEMA" is something that the audience doesn't deserve. Yes, the AUDIENCE DOESN'T DESERVE THIS, THEY DESERVE BETTER. The attitude of these makers are such medicore movies is on cloud 9 and they pretend like they have given the audience some absolutely new kind of experience whereas it's 2022 and any cinephile who is just not crazy about mass cinema is very well aware of much much much superior works of directors like Martin Scorsese, David Fincher, Quentin Tarantino, Christopher Nolan, etc. These directors aren't even qualified enough to be the assistants of such mavericks.
The Solution
The film makers are only at fault. Right? Wrong! As audiences we also have to be matured enough to differentiate between good and bad movie. Yes, it's your money, you will be the one whose gonna spent it but there are times when you should take chances and give a try something different. That's why I watched 2 movies in theatres which didn't gave me a feel like "why did I came theatre for this? I could have watched it on ott easily" like I had for some films like Runway 34 & Rakshabandhan. An Action Hero & Ramsetu were 2 movies which deserved lot more than what they got. Agree that Ramsetu was terrible in the VFX department, but it still deserved more than the collection of 75 crores and An Action Hero which turned out to be a total disaster at the box office, was thoroughly entertaining with good comedy scenes & very good action set pieces set up in an interesting story.
The Change
Changes will be there and will be there for the good only. Films that are suited for theatres only will see the release and mediocrity will be minimized as much as possible. Also, as audiences we will also get a bunch of choices to what to watch and what to reject, and yes, REJECT, not BOYCOTT as this new drama of boycott has started which affects the movies on social media only else heavily boycotted movies like Brahmastra wouldn't have grossed 250 crores. And the audience very well knows what disrespects them and what doesn't. They can very well understand the difference between a crapfest like Shamshera which disrespected the tribal freedom fighters and upper class brahmins in a terrible way and between a fantasy adventure drama like Brahmastra which is a great visual treat.
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