The ever-evolving world of filmmaking

The film industry during the 70s and 80s consisted mostly of prospect hunters. There were established production houses but more coming every day to give a shot to filmmaking. The Hindi film industry moved from Lahore to Kolkata and thence to Mumbai where it prospered, throbbed and still delivers anything between 150 to 200 films every year.

But 90% of the films fail to deliver and lose the investment on regular basis. Why does this happen and why do more people still flock to the industry wanting to make films? Where do the new funds come from if most who invest here exit with losses? It is now called an industry but it is more like a casino where the stakes are always against the investor.

There are two sides to this losses and investment circle as well as two phases: the era of independent producers and the era of the corporate culture filmmaking, marketing era. The corporate kind now calls the shots. Like the West, India too followed a studio system, each having a number of actors and technicians on its muster. That era gave some great artistes as well as the creative minds. Most of them fell to the high risk business of filmmaking eventually. There were studios like Bombay Talkies, Filmistan, Filmalaya, Ranjit, Basant, Prabhat, Kohinoor, Imperial and so on. But films have had this magnetic power to draw people from all over, either to act or to be in related creative fields. Aspirations drove many youth to take a train to Mumbai. Big stars, big banners all had Punjab background till Amitabh Bachchan happened in the 1970s. Getting back to independent filmmakers, they flourished following the end of the studio system. The thing about filmmaking was that it required no qualification if you had money. If not, it was a hard climb till one could make his own film. In the film industry, nobody cared where the money came from as long as it did. The industry ran on suspect money sources as politicians, diamond merchants, farm owners, businessmen, smugglers and, eventually, the underworld started bankrolling the films. ontent and quality was never the priority, money was. Filmmaking may not be a profitable business for most, but it ran kitchens while a film was under production. The system as it worked, a producer had to just sign a pro note and a film processing lab guarantee and he could raise monies. There were so many independent producers who thrived on the law of averages. There were regular banners like BR Films, Shakti Films, Pramod Films, Rajshri Productions, Yash Raj Films, Nadiadwala brothers and many score more big time and small filmmakers, who accounted for hits as well as flops but had learnt the business of filmmaking and ended up with a number of film negatives under their names. When Doordarshan came on the scene, the same negative earned from DD terrestrial telecast rights and, now, private TV channels telecast rights. Luckily, these rights are for a limited period and re-occur every few years.

The era of independent producers came to an end when the studios with foreign resources entered the fray. It all began with Amitabh Bachchan Corp Ltd. Banker Uday Kotak sensed a brand value in Bachchan which led the forming of the company. Bachchan was designated as a brand in himself but the company came on the verge of bankruptcy. The ABCL sunk faster than it was launched. With the opening of the economy, though not immediately, came the entry of corporate film companies. They were led by a marketing graduates. As most realised in due time, film was more a business of instincts rather than marketing expertise. Some of these companies paid a price for learning the ropes and some, like Disney, Pyramid Saimira, Eros, and Warner Brothers, decided to opt out of filmmaking. The prominent among them are Yash Raj, Sajid Nadiadwala, Karan Johar, Vinod Chopra-raju Hirani, Rajshris Productions, Excel Entertainment, and a few others. But save for Yash Raj, almost all others are sourced by the studios. The actors who have turned producers, Akshay Kumar, Shah Rukh Khan, Aamir Khan, John Abraham, Kangana Ranaut, are backed by corporate finance. What has changed for the film industry with the coming of this new culture is that the working of every aspect has become transparent. The money deals are all above board doing away with the black money component which earlier sustained the industry. No wonder than that there was not a word of discontent from film folk when demonetisation happened. There is no way an independent producer can even dream of making and marketing a film oh his own strength. The cost of making a film and then taking it to the audience is beyond him. IANS

CIn the film industry, nobody cared where the money came from as long as it did. The industry ran on suspect money sources as politicians, diamond merchants,..