The Diary of a Frustrated Indian Film
Buff
Hollywood
has tapped India’s non-English viewers for years, but domestic industries
remain half-hearted in their bid to reach viewers outside their home states
By
Anna MM Vetticad
This is not so much a
column as it is the diary of a frustrated, furious Indian film buff.
March 2016: I note that Marathi
director Nagraj Manjule’s Sairat will be in theatres in April. The wait
for his second film began the day his first – the much-acclaimed inter-caste
relationship saga, Fandry – was released in 2014.
April 29: Sairat is here and as
usual, booking websites and newspaper listings do not specify whether it
has subtitles. I do what most viewers clearly cannot – I phone Manjule, who
confirms it has English subs everywhere outside Maharashtra.
April 29 evening: I am at a PVR for
another film, so I decide to book a ticket for Sairat. I am cautious as
always since there have been occasions when I was informed by directors and senior
multiplex chain staffers that a film was subtitled, only to find no subs when I
watched it. So I double check with the booking counter executive. Sairat is
not subtitled, he replies.
I tell him what the
filmmaker told me. No subs, he insists. Could he ask a senior? Please? None is
available, he says, adding that if a show of the film were on at that moment,
he would have dashed in to verify this himself. Bizarre. He should not have to
do that, I say.
Could you return
tomorrow, he asks? No, I cannot spend an entire hour on another day driving all
the way here and back, for information that should be on his computer right
now. Time is not a joke.
I ask for a phone
number I can later call. He manages to locate a senior and confirms that this
hall is indeed showing a subtitled Sairat. Whew! I book, after 30
minutes wasted over this inexplicable inefficiency.
April 30: I am moved by Sairat’s
inter-caste romance with its remarkably light touch despite the grim
subject. I recall the previous day’s casual multiplex employee and wonder, for
the nth time in my life, why it takes such an effort to be a committed viewer
of films across Indian languages.
Rewind to February:
Tamil director Vetri Maaran’s Visaaranai is out. I’m
still drowning in my love for Kaaka Muttai, the film about two little
Chennai slum dwellers that he produced last year, and I have been looking
forward to this one. Again, no mention of subtitles anywhere.
I am swamped with work so I avoid the rigmarole of calls to Maaran and so on.
May
8: I catch a subtitled Visaaranai at
Delhi’s Habitat Film Festival. I am floored by this gut- wrenching story of
police torture. It has just won the National Award for Best Tamil Film. It
deserved Best Film. Sadly, most of India does not know that.
Over
a decade since Holly
wood made it standard practice
to release Hindi, Tamil
and Telugu dubbed versions of all their
big-budget, sci-fi/fantasy action
adventures and thrillers simultaneously with the English originals, India’s
industries are still waffling in their efforts to reach out to audiences outside
their home states.
Bahubali’s
well-strategised pursuit of a pan-India
viewership in 2015 was unusual. S.S. Rajamouli’s film was made in Telugu and
Tamil, dubbed in multiple languages and aggressively marketed across the
country, not just in southern India or to Telugu expats. Result: Rs 500 crore
domestic gross collections, the highest ever for an Indian film (source: forbes.com).
That
said, Bahubali was inherently mass-oriented. Many makers of low-budget,
niche and/or indie projects say crowds are unlikely to flock to dubbed versions
of their films, and their natural viewers tend to prefer subtitles over dubbing
anyway.
Fair
enough, then subtitle. And if you do, let the world know you have!
May
16: Exasperated by this long-running
problem, I phone Maaran to vent some steam. My questions to him apply equally
to Tamil, Hindi, Telugu and India’s smaller industries.
First,
is subtitling expensive? Answer: the cost of subtitling the average Tamil film
is about Rs 50,000.
Not
a forbidding figure, which makes you wonder why all Indian films are not
subtitled outside their home territories. The clichéd response from producers
is that collections beyond a film’s traditional audience are minuscule.
Most
producers lack the vision to see that subtitling makes their films accessible
to non- traditional audiences, which could translate into their stars becoming
more familiar and thus more attractive to audiences and producers outside their
home turf over time, which in turn would lead to more inter-regional exchanges
of acting talent, more pan-India audiences for all Indian films and ultimately,
a better spread of all languages outside states in which they are usually spoken.
Unless you reach out to others, how will you reach them?
As
puzzling as those who do not subtitle their films are those who do. If you made
the effort, you are obviously interested in new markets. Why then would you not
let the public know your film is subtitled?
“It
is a simple matter of communication,” says Maaran, “but most exhibitors
(theatre owners) don’t do it and distributors don’t push them since they are
targeting the diaspora. Any non-diaspora audience that comes in is a bonus.
What can producers do?” At least talk to them,
please.
It
is hard to believe that distributors have to move mountains or spend millions
to convince exhibitors, e-booking sites and listings collators to merely
mention that a film is subtitled. It is hard to fathom unenterprising
exhibitors, since every ticket sold benefits them. And it is hard for a
tormented film buff to understand why common sense does not prevail.
(This article
was first published in The Hindu Businessline on May 21, 2016)
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Photo captions: Posters from (1) Sairat (2) Visaaranai
Photographs courtesy:
