There?s a buzz around Sanjay Leela Bhansali?s Saawariya, set for a November 2007 release. Not only because it?s only his fifth film after the hugely successful Khamoshi, Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam, Devdas and Black. Or that it?s a romantic comedy starring two star children, Anil Kapoor?s daughter Sonam and Neetu and Rishi Kapoor?s son Ranvir. Industry watchers are keenly awaiting the release as it will be the first Hindi film to be produced by a Hollywood studio.
Sony Pictures Entertainment announced the project with much fanfare at the end of 2005. Says Uday Singh, MD, Sony Pictures India: ?It marked the dawn of a new and exciting chapter in the life of Sony Pictures Releasing, India.? Needless to say, Saawariya will see a worldwide release and knowing Sony?s clout in the global arena, Brand India will make a huge splash. ?A foreign player allows Indian producers to tap the vast global network of studios, thereby showcasing their work outside the home market and acquiring greater exposure for their films.?
As it turns out, there?s a new dawn in Bollywood with foreign and many Indian production houses taking major strides in putting Indian films on a global platform. Yash Raj Films and Walt Disney Studios are working exclusively to co-produce a series of animation films, the first to be directed by Jugal Hansraj.
As Bollywood?s borders melt, production houses are going the whole hog to ensure Indian films get a much wider release worldwide. Take UTV, for example. It has strategic tie-ups with three of the top five Hollywood media majors: Fox, Sony and Disney. It co-produced Mira Nair?s The Namesake, is co-producing M Night Shyamalan?s The Happening, committing $30 million to the project. Or consider this: for Rakesh Mehra?s (Rang De Basanti) next, 5 Kaurav, UTV has Hollywood screenplay guru Syd Field on board to work on an ?already high-calibre script? to ensure its global appeal. For Vishal Bhardwaj?s next project ? a film set in the Burma of 1945 ? the script is already with Hollywood beauty Uma Thurman and others.
Another Indian entertainment major, the London-based Eros International, is also doing its bit to put Brand India out there. Says COO Jyoti Deshpande: ?We have already globally distributed Omkara, Salaam-e-Ishq, Eklavya, Namastey London and Cheeni Kum. Global distribution makes total sense as it gives us greater leverage across geography and formats and strategically control the marketing and distribution better.?
But obviously Eros wanted to play a larger role than that of a distributor, so it has integrated back into production as well. ?We have acquired over 50 films under production through our various tie-ups. Anurag Kashyap?s No Smoking with John Abraham will be the first production to release this September. We have Goldie Behl-directed Abhishek-Priyanka starrer Drona, then we have Sunday and several other films in the works,? points out Deshpande.
The rapid corporatisation of Bollywood is making a lot of directors happy too. Says Anurag Kashyap: ?The producers have left me alone. I never saw an Eros representative on the sets. It?s a great deal for a filmmaker who wants creative freedom.? After the global release of Cheeni Kum, Eros is set to release David Dhawan?s Salman-Govinda starrer Partner, to be followed by the poignant drama Gandhi My Father and Sajid Nadiadwala?s Heyy Babyy.
Production houses are also reaching out to regional cinema. ?The studio is language agnostic. So we will venture into Tamil, Telugu or any other regional cinema if the content and the framework is right,? says Singh of Sony Pictures. Of the total 1,090 films produced in India in 2006, 223 films were in Hindi and 162 were in Tamil. Deshpande admits that after Hindi, ?Tamil is the most lucrative segment for us.?
With 3.9 billion tickets, growing multiplexes, rising ticket prices and exponential increase in box office, the Indian film industry is admittedly going through its most glorious phase. And, yet, as Deshpande points out, ?the sector is so fragmented that you will see it go through a period of consolidation where four or five major studios will emerge like in Hollywood and then you will have a few mini majors below that tier.? But that?s another story.
