Apart
from the lights and crackers, Diwali is
also a day of grand releases in cinema.
Irrespective of the movie’s run at
the box office, the producers make their
money with the fantastic opening weekend
collections that have attained mammoth proportions.
This year close to 10 movies are expected
to release on the Diwali day, October 21.
Prominent movies of frontline heroes are
being released this Diwali and producers
are in a rat race to get a hold of the best
theatres in the city for the releases. Under
these circumstances, lack of theatres may
pose a threat to the releases of some of
the movies.
Unakkum
Enakkum, VV, Em Magan, Thimiru, Lage
Raho Munnabhai are the movies that
register good collections at the box
office and are running full houses
weeks after their release. Will the
theatre operators be ready to wind
up those movies – which are
making good business - for the sake
of new releases is a question to be
answered.
Besides, Chennai has 74 theatres and
only a handful qualify to host the
release of the big stars’ movies.
Only very few theatres boast to have
the DTS facility and there is stiff
competition to acquire those theatres
for the new releases.
Not
being able to find good theatres to release
films can seriously affect the opening
collections, which can more or less seal
the fate of the movie.
Movies
like Godfather – which has Ajit
in the lead in 3 roles and is renamed
as Varalaru, Vallavan that has Simbu
in the lead, Dharmapuri with Vijayakanth,
E with Jeeva, Thirumagan with Sarathkumar,
Vathiyar, Vattaram, and Thalaimagan
are the ones that have created huge
expectations and are gearing up for
the Diwali release race. Among these
Godfather and Vallavan are the frontrunners
and have already gained favor with
distributors and exhibitors. Most
of the top theatres in the state have
already charted either of these two
films for Diwali.
On
the other hand, Diwali is also the time
during which the Income Tax department spurs
into action. The IT dept. is known to make
raids on the houses of film personalities
during Diwali season hoping to find something
big. Film personalities are getting ready
for these raids by alerting their accountants
to keep all the accounts in the right shape,
fit for scrutiny by the IT officers.
