The New Formula

Bollywood has perfected the art of thought control. Couldn’t have been otherwise. For, its hall of fame (or infamy if you like) has always had the motto ringing loud and clear: buck up or go bust. In this cut-throat realm of images, the ability to read the mind of a potential audience is not merely one among the many qualities meant to be flaunted around, but is imperative for success and survival.

That Hindi filmmakers can also double up as professional mind-readers has, however, ceased to be a safe maxim, thanks to the chaos that has descended upon the box office recently. Therefore, One two ka Four is not only a film title, it’s also an incantation of hope.

The spinners of big-budget masala yarns seem to have lost their magical dexterity and perhaps find it increasingly difficult to fathom the mind of the ‘ideal’ viewer. That is precisely why roughly one in five films released annually recovers its money. There is no crash-proof formula. Sometimes when boy meets girl, it’s a hit, but there are times when it’s a flop. The mind of the Hindi film buff is now more complex than an adolescent on the couch.

And even the mighty have not been able to escape the curse of the inexplicable. Reveals trade pundit Amod Mehra: "Though Aamir Khan’s charm earned Mela a tolerably good recovery from Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and central India, it didn’t do well in Mumbai and Rajasthan." Shahrukh Khan’s pet project, Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani, was even worse off. According to Mehra, after each show a few hundred tickets were torn up. Not in sheer frustration-though there was enough cause for that-but because this ticket-tearing was a desperate attempt to conceal the fact that it had few takers. And finally, Anil Kapoor-starrer Bulandi had the distinction of being this year’s all-India flop.

Last year, too, 12 big-starrers, big banners that did everything right-played hip music, never let narration interfere with the jig, managed to jerk out tears at the right moments, conditioned itself to the front benches as well as the dress circle-fell flat on their pancakes. Dillagi, Hu

Tu Tu, Hello Brother, Mann, Mast and more came tumbling down. Distributors lost money. But the industry continued to being douched with even more dough, blissfully oblivious of the new reality. You can punish Hindi films for what they are, slam them, take an oath not to see them, but when a Yash Chopra or a Yash Johar or a Subhash Ghai merely whispers that he dreamt of a script, money-bags land at their doorsteps. And soon they won’t be exceptions.

The reason for this optimism, most importantly, is the emergence of the overseas market which, in Yash Johar’s opinion, is today as big as two Indian film markets put together. But there are of course a clutch of other factors as well: the interests of corporate leviathans like Coke and Swatch in symbiotic flings with what’s pathetically called Bollywood, the business that film music can do, the ascent of financiers like Bharat Shah who can single-handedly finance a whole movie, an impending entry of banks and the corporatisation of film companies with definite plans to go public and more.

Bollywood, strafed by bombs last year, shows how chaos can trigger control, observes filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt. Akshay Kumar predicts a phoenix-from-the-ashes future for the industry in two years. Vinay Shukla, who directed Godmother, also sees the teetering titan getting its act together in a couple of years. But then it’s not so straight and easy.

Film production has fallen steadily, from around 1,000 films in 1994 to 600 last year. Says media commentator Gurbir Singh: "This year, the effect of last year’s dismal showing will reduce it even further-by half." Yet, film exports will continue to shoot up-from just Rs 20 crore in the 1980s to Rs 275 crore in 1997 and Rs 400 crore by March 2000. It will have peaked to an unprecedented Rs 1,000 crore in the coming year. The score-sheet on big budget films reads crushing losses. Yet investments continue to distend. This amazing see-saw anticipates an industry shake-up, before it settles down. What had initially seemed to be a kamikaze leap into a blackhole is slowly transmutating into a bid at survival.

Every dark cloud here now comes embroidered with silver and also gold at times. Budgets continue to float, cresting at a Rs 16-20-crore investment per film. But for a film to attract initials, the draw at urban centres that define its box-office fate needs supernovas who cost super money, says Shukla. But the saleable Khans-Aamir, Shahrukh and Salman-are preoccupied with home productions (Lagaan, Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani and Hello Brother respectively), following Jackie Shroff and Sunny Deol, thus necessitating not only self-discipline (through well-planned productions) but also cost-cutting. Shakti Samanta, filmmaker and chief of the Indian Motion Pictures Producers Association, insists stars appreciate the need to allow the distributor (among the hardest hit) to recover before their money refurbishes the dream factory. Says N.N. Sippy, filmmaker and head of the Indian Motion Pictures Distributors Association: "Sunny Deol and Ajay Devgan-through papa Veeru-are also taking on the distributors’ mantle."

Though last year saw over 90 per cent of the 150 films released levelled to the ground (one-third of these had a stellar cast, and even the Khan mystique failed) it threw up lessons for the future. Phir Bhi..., released last fortnight, is a case in point. The original Shahrukh launchpad got together to float Dreamz Unlimited-Juhi Chawla turned co-producer with Aziz Mirza directing dynamo Shahrukh who also took charge of publicity. Mehra observes: "They won’t charge their usual fee (Shahrukh charges over Rs 3 crore per film). They finish it within Rs 10 crore. With music rights at Rs 3.5 crore, foreign rights at Rs 4.5 crore (without calculating earnings from the six Indian territories) they’ve already recovered their Rs 8-10 crore investment." They have also, along the way, learned the trick of disciplining the disorderly, finishing the film within a reasonable (read affordable) time-less than a year. There are scores of such examples. Aamir Khan Productions is shooting Lagaan at Bhuj on a tight three-month schedule, while Kamalahaasan finished Hey Ram’s Hindi and Tamil versions in 312 rolls, exploiting live location sound for the first time. Besides, there are innumerable spin-offs which follow-sale of software rights to satellite channels which still bank on Bollywood. Now the industry also has corporate sponsors-cosy with the idea of riding on superstar shoulders-stampeding for a place within the frame. Swatch, Pepsi, Mahindra are among the half-a-dozen labels that make it to more than the credits in Phir Bhi.. Shahrukh swoons over Juhi at a Swatch (surely peaking sales of its rose model) counter and rampages through the jungle in a red Santro, outwitting villains with its marvellous power steering. Taal’s marriage with Coke earned filmmaker Subhash Ghai a decent dowry. Parvez Farooqui, executive director to Subhash Ghai, reveals Coke paid Rs 1 crore for publicity. Rakesh Roshan is not just saying Kaho Naa.. Coke ke saath. He is also asking Kaho na Times card se pyar kyon hai, as other sponsors like Kingfisher Premium and Pantaloons grace the contest. Ghai had set this trend, by giving (and we assume extracting) maximum mileage to the Yamaha in Hero and Coke in Taal.

Ghai provides perspective: "A Hindi film today generates lot of money. Even a flop earns money-for the producer if he has sold it at a good price or the distributor if he has bought it at the right price or the music company or TV channels. Taal profited the overseas distributor enormously but the one in Bihar lost money. So, the industry will never run short of funds." In fact, there may be some new money.

Ghai reveals that Ratan Tata has asked his boys to study the industry. He believes that some people want to invest here for sheer glamour. According to one of the biggest showmen of our times, the largest quantum of growth in India will be in the Internet and the entertainment industries. He doesn’t believe that the ABCL fiasco has scared investors. Avers Ghai: "Those executives in dandy jackets knew nothing. Unlike us in Mukta Arts. In fact, we’re looking at going public soon."

All the good news, however, is confined to big banners. Johar points out: "Small and medium-budget films won’t be viable while competing with big starrers with more money to blow their trumpets before and during the release. With so many avenues of entertainment today, he is going to be choosy with films. And he will choose the big ones. This will further reduce film production." Shyam Benegal, however, surprisingly enough, is more optimistic. He believes: "Hindi film industry has behaved like a cottage industry. Now there is a change. With tax rates falling, stars have reduced the black money component in fees." And Roshan affirms that view. Says he: "Ninety per cent stars take a major part of their payments in cheques. The older generation, belonging to an era of unreasonable tax rates, still believes in hiding and hoarding money."

The whisper of Hollywood (Columbia Tristar, Paramount, Universal Pictures) flirting with co-productions here is likely to discipline the bucking behemoth. Markets, even overseas, are fragmenting. After KKHH, there has been no pan-Indian hit. And while the UK and the US are major markets, there are splinter groups in other countries-for instance, Rajnikanth is a Japanese heart-throb while aging Mithun strides Dubai. Also-with overseas rights contributing 40 per cent to a film’s returns-tales pandering to nostalgic NRI’s are easier told than ones which beguile both a farmhand in Bihar and a college kid in Mumbai.

The industry may still be awash with rogue money, that has kept away concepts like "insurance" and "transparency". But the government’s carrot of conferring "industry status" with attendant sops like bank-financing is adding strange words like "completion bonds" and "star commitments" to filmi vocabulary. Ghai was the first to insure Taal for Rs 10 lakh (Rs 11 crore sum assured), while Yash Chopra has reportedly insured Amitabh-Shahrukh starrer Mohabattein.

Piracy still throttles filmdom though. But the industry is hitting back-not just by hiring security agencies, but also flooding the markets with prints. Sooraj Barjatya stumped pirates with over 500 prints of HSSH both here and abroad. Music rights, too, has lit up many Black Fridays-like Takshak and 1947 which performed inconsistently at the box-office but had tunes that had many humming for more. Taal (music rights sold for Rs 3.75 crore) and HSSH (music rights Rs 6 crore) rode the US top charts, even as Mohabattein’s music mops up a stupendous Rs 7 crore.

A.R. Rehman, Jatin-Lalit and Anu Malik survived the bid to create a multi-composer formula. It failed with Dillagi whose music, despite four composers, did not exactly set cash registers ringing. Says Malik: "Notice that all films with hit music have single music directors-Taal, Biwi No 1, Janam Samjha Karo. I have stopped doing scores with several composers. The film director just exposes his lack of motivation by hiring too many." He, too, believes technology will tame the tipsy titan. "I am concentrating on production. Designed music, new sound and new ideas-fuse analog with digital without veering away from melody." Another masala in this pickle of nine flavours is the star-as-singer formula. Aamir’s Aati Kya Khandala in Ghulam has many echoes-Salman (Hello Brother), Amitabh (Sooryavansham), Shahrukh, Rani Mukherjee and Kamalahaasan (Hey Ram). Other surefire recipes have been Shilpa Shetty gyrating to a number in Shool that appealed instantly to the ‘rustic’ sensibilities of Bihar and UP. This has, in fact, done well to seduce the cowbelt audiences to watch the film. Other new concoctions which have gone down well are a "mega song" to capture attention a la Malaika Arora in Dil Se.., the Millennium number in Mela and the ‘Que Sera Sera’ sequence in Pukaar (shot thrice!) where India-rubber Prabhu Deva gives stiff competition to dhak-dhak Dixit, while it achieved another coup by picturising Lata Mangeshkar and a must-have shaadi number (a desperate Hum Apke Hain Kaun clone, incorporated in HSSH) to tap resurgent traditionalism.

But it dare not forget modern technology while cosying up to revivalism. Bhatt, therefore, is right when he says: "Cinema is an aging whore. TV which services you at home, is younger, more seducing. Besides, the divide between middle-class, poor, super-elite is deeper. The needs of an NRI audience are different from that of an Orissa front-bencher. Indian films will also have to learn to compete with Hollywood productions." Already, the West is being roped in-Hey Ram has American computer graphics expert Mark Holmes, while its background score is recorded in Europe, a first for India. Shekhar Kapoor, striding both worlds, has been the herald in ways more than one-insurance covered litigation over Bandit Queen, while Elizabeth was reportedly completed in 142 days.

All this adds up to project a sufficiently futuristic scenario for the Hindi film industry. In fact, the rumblings can already be heard. Phir Bhi.. and Pukaar will be e-promoted by hungama.com.

Besides, the quest for a variety in screenplays is perhaps becoming more central to success than a stellar cast. Mela’s failure indicates that copying from Sholay-like mega-grossers of the past is actually a desperation of the industry to come up with something that clicks. And the search has not always been futile. Akshay-starrer Ajnabee seeks inspiration from Consenting Adults, Shahrukh-starrer Josh from West Side Story and Sunjay Dutt’s Khauff will replay Juror. Gurbir Singh also predicts greater TV involvement. Zee TV, which has set up its own animation studio, is doing four films including Sunny Deol-starrer Gaddar. Star also plans to turn financier, investing Rs 125 crore. So is Sony, while Nimbus will launch its own showbiz channel.

The Rs 5,000-crore industry may still be aching with last year’s failure. But the success abroad of Taal which, according to Singh, outflanked Hollywood blockbusters like Eyes Wide Shut has filmmakers lusting for more. Old-timers like N.N. Sippy may fondly rue: "I lost my money on Chowpatty. I must look for it there." But the more savvy lot are looking beyond the seven seas.