Cinemas count on 'Chandu Champion' after string of Bollywood flops in first half of 2024

Chandu Champion expected to big some respite for theatres.

Bollywood, the biggest contributor to box office business, has been shying away from releasing movies, leaving theatres in a critical state with many shutting shop temporarily due to a dry spell in supply of new content.

During this challenging time, one ray of hope in the first quarter of FY25 is the newly-released big-ticket Hindi movie Chandu Champion featuring Kartik Aaryan.

"Buzz for the film is relatively good. Now, it is about storytelling taking over. We hope that it does capture the imagination of the audience. It is a tale well told, it is a film that can excite people to come to cinemas. We are keeping our fingers crossed," said Akshaye Rathi, film exhibitor/director, Saroj Screens, who is expecting a steady supply of tentpole films to ease the struggle exhibitors are facing currently.

Occupancy in Q1 FY25 is estimated to be in the range of 20-22 percent with exhibitors cutting shows and capacity on the back of a muted content pipeline, said Karan Taurani, senior vice-president, Elara Capital.

"Hindi box office in Q1 FY25 is expected to decline by 21 percent year-on-year (YoY) to Rs 580 crore. Regional content has fared well only in the Malayalam genre, which has already reported gross box office of Rs 1,000 crore in 2024 so far, double year-on-year, led by small and medium
budget films doing well consistently," he said.

However, a drag in Hindi cinema is still worrying exhibitors like Rathi.

"It seems like the entire Hindi film fraternity is gripped by paranoia where they are not even setting sail (releasing movies). We are hopeful that with a few Hindi releases coming back into play, the big-ticket mainstream cinema becomes consistent and the exhibition sector finally gets some respite. The only big ticket movie releases in Hindi this year were Shaitaan and Bade Miyan Chote Miyan and only Shaitaan did well. It has been a brutal six months for the sector this year so far. We are hoping that starting with Chandu Champion and the releases after that, the situation settles," the exhibitor said.

He added that while movies like Munjya have done well and are a blockbuster for producers, there has been little respite for theatres. "

"While it is great to see small and medium budget films doing well one after the other, it is time we have tentpole films with Rs 300-500 crore numbers because we need to keep the exhibition sector churning and such movies allow us to meet operating expenses. A lot of screens decided to remain shut because they need a consistent supply of content that has the capability to fill up screens and that hasn't happened in a while."

Rathi is hoping for more tentpole mainstream cinema movies.

"We need more mainstream commercial films that work in single screens, multiplexes across Tier I, II markets. Unfortunately this year such releases have been far too low. At least next year, we hope there are big ticket movies releasing every couple of weeks. If we look at Hindi, there are a few Akshay Kumar, Ajay Devgn films but there are no Shah Rukh Khan or Salman Khan movies," he said.

The big ticket actors don't have a release this year and that is what's scary. While I appreciate that we are choosing quality over quantity, I think that there can be a steady stream of big releases which we have seen in the past, Rathi added.

Second quarter onwards movie releases like Sarfira, Indian 2, Stree 2, and Kalki 2898 AD will drive occupancy.

"We expect green shoots in occupancy levels and metrics in Q2 FY25 and this performance could accelerate further based on a strong lineup of regional and English films, which could result in an occupancy level of 24.8 percent in FY25."

We expect momentum to continue in FY26, led by comeback of large ticket franchise films in Hindi, such as Housefull 5, War 2, Ramayana, Dhamaal 4, Sikandar, Spirit and Golmaal 5 and in English, such as Captain America, Fast X, Mission Impossible, Superman, Batman, Avatar, Star Wars, and Fantastic Four, which would support recovery in occupancy, Taurani noted.