This post is being in the context of Telugu Film Industry.
Observing the trends for the past two years - I cannot but relish the fact that the only movies into which sufficient effort was put were received by the audiences.
Racap of 2008:
Hits: Gamyam, Ready, KBL.
Average: Krishna, Jalsa, Parugu, Kantri, Asta Chemma, Hareram (Believe me Hareram is a decent flick and I rate it above the rest in this category!)
Films which stood out by pure performance from Artists: Dasavatharam and Surya s/o Krishnan.
And coming into 2009 the sense of audience seems to be getting richer! As of 2009, there are only 2 hits — Arundhati and Maghadheera.
A striking point common in both these films is the number of the days the films were in shoot. I have a gut feeling that both the artists as well as the audience are realizing the importance of effort and the importance of production values.
Some facts:
The movie Arundhati was shot twice! The first version of Arundhati took 210 days to shoot and the producer did not like it. He took another 40 days to shoot the version two with changes. And in those 40 days He felt he did 70% better to original version. The second version was finally released and was a block buster hit in both Telugu and Tamil languages.
Maghadheera went into for around 288 days and was in production for more than an year and is almost certain to beat all the records in the industry hand down.
Let us hope that this trend continues and the production values are held high.
ps: Flimfare Awards 2008 are out.
August 2nd, 2009 at 12:48 am
would like to include “kick” in 2009 hits…still running packed houses..and saw magadheera today :D
August 2nd, 2009 at 5:52 am
Dasavatharam was one of the worst movies that I’ve ever seen. I came out of the theatre midway!
August 2nd, 2009 at 11:25 am
@Sumanth I rated it for the performance of the Kamal Hassan. On the whole, the picture is weak.
@Kali Haha… Nenu Matinee :) Kick was ok-ish. It is not in the league of these pictures.
August 2nd, 2009 at 9:26 pm
I can only deduce that you are a fan of Chiru and family.
Otherwise, how can you say that Magadheera is a hit before it has had a decent run ?
August 2nd, 2009 at 9:44 pm
The film is technically rich, which was want I wanted to throw light on. Besides that, the bookings for the first week are more than indicative of the trends. The film has already grossed 20+ crores. I think it will be rather foolish to deny that Magadheera is not yet a hit :)
August 3rd, 2009 at 2:17 pm
@prasant
donno how a hit is termed.And film has already grossed 20? do u think a tollywood movie can collect 20c in 3 days? Figures are good if they are closer to truth. There are not more than 2500 theaters in A.P and how many do u think are hosting Magadheera? Not more than 1/4 I guess. How good each theatre is? The theater in A.P that gets the most revenue when full (outside multiplex) is devi with 50k at max. Considering the dearth of good theaters, I would put the average at Lakshminarasimha, a theater which Prasant knows well. It would yield 16k per show. So 600 theatres will generate 1 cr per show and there are 12 shows in 3 days. I dont see how the movie can collect 20 cr in 3 days.
And if u think bookings for first week are more than indicative, u should add an extra category superhit for the previous year and move one of the average movs up there.
If you are speaking abt the commercially successful ventures, krishna is a hit (I did not like it)
August 3rd, 2009 at 2:48 pm
but given the league…its more like genre….CGI inflated movies should be given a diferent genre than….me not speaking con magadheera..rather under stood the no of hits industry has ,happy days should have never been compared to other “hits” ..thoda kottu chinna
August 3rd, 2009 at 2:59 pm
@manoj This includes collections from Audio sales/rights, overseas/satellite rights as well.
Possibly, we would be better off rating the movies as Tier 1, Tier 2 etc.
August 3rd, 2009 at 4:27 pm
cannt agree more @prasant…divide the movies in to tiers n critic them.. aaah..finally its the entertainment that matters…..hail talaiva.the man who defied all logics including the entertainment value
September 3rd, 2009 at 6:40 am
Out of context .
What we can agree on is that the funding for this movie came from the scores of Prajarajyam contestants who were left with egg on their faces.
So compared to the 2000 crores they grossed in that mega drama , 50 crores on this movie was a shilling.
September 12th, 2009 at 7:05 am
@sleeper
jagan is missing u here!! why dont u take up priyadarshini ram`s post (he is the sakshi editor)