Why Bollywood is losing to the South Indian Cinema

It’s time Bollywood think different

Bollywood’s nationwide box office collection in the first eight months of 2022 has crossed Rs 2,299 crore. It was Rs 917 crore and Rs 717 crore in 2021 and 2020 respectively. Although?Bollywoodis recovering from the pandemic years, it is still distant from the 2019 collection of Rs 5,200 crore, says the data provided by the State Bank of India in its August Ecowrap.?Bollywood?is?losing?out to?South?Indian?cinema.

What are the reasons??

According to the data, the key reasons behind the fall include poor content, a decline in single-screen theatres, heavy entertainment tax on Hindi movies and the rise of OTT platforms.?

In terms of content, the report says that the average IMDB rating for 43?Bollywood?movies released since January 2021 was merely 5.9. It is way below the 7.3 rating of Hindi-dubbed movies. Before the pandemic, up to 80 movies were released per year in Hindi with the collection ranging from Rs 3,000- Rs 5,500 crore. This has come down to a total of 61 movies since January 2021. The collection was just Rs 3,200 crore.?

The rise of multiplexes has contributed to the decline of single-screen?cinema?halls in?Bollywood. This along with the entertainment tax has caused a hike in ticket rates. In?South?India, the concentration of single screens is far higher. That is one of the reasons why?South?Indian?movies perform better than Hindi movies. Moreover,?South?India has a higher population of older?cinema-goers who prefer theatres over online. Whereas in North India, millennials form the major chunk of cine lovers and they like digital options. The emergence of OTT platforms has adversely affected the cash flow of?Bollywood. It is high time?Bollywood?start devising new strategies.?