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Debate

HYPE -- DOES THE END JUSTIFY THE COSTS?
Filmdom has found a new mantra for publicity. And it’s called Blitzkreig. The general belief seems to be that more you publicise your film, the more viewers you lure to the theatres. The million rupee question is, does it help at all?

JP DUTTA’s mega publicity for Refugee seems to have reopened debate on whether hype does pay at all. But for the unprecedented media and street publicity, his film may not have taken a 100 per cent initial, especially since he was introducing newcomers Abhishek Bachchan and Kareena Kapoor as the lead pair. He baffled the entire public and the film industry, spending crores on the publicity with full-page advertisements in many national dailies, which reach a sizeable section of the cine audience, besides of course using the satellite and television media to the hilt. His strategy worked wonders, too.

Of late, every big producer seems to be giving more importance to publicity. Being the basic part of show business, every film requires to be publicised in a big way, not only to lure audiences but also to create great expectations in the minds of viewers about the film and highlight all who have contributed to its making, especially the stars, director and music composer.

In the past, even average publicity was enough for a film because the audience was then familiar with only banners like Prabhat, New Theatres, Bombay Talkies, Wadia and Ranjit and had faith in their products. Later, filmmakers like Shantaram, Mehboob Khan, Bimal Roy, Guru Dutt, Raj Kapoor, Dev Anand and BR Chopra also built up their own banners in which the audience had sufficient faith.

But with the emergence of a new crop of filmmakers, the need for greater publicity has been increasingly felt, as they had to build their reputation in the market.

Today, big publicity has become the order of the day because of the threat posed by cable networks which show the latest films on the first day of their releases itself, thus damaging their theatrical run.

But the question is, will big publicity really pay and deliver the goods. Will publicity pay if the film has no merit? Shah Rukh Khan indulged in extraordinary publicity for his film, Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani. But did it pay? Divergent views were expressed by some leading film personalities on the vexing question.

MERIT IS CRUCIAL
SANTOSH SINGH JAIN
“It is a rat race,” says Santosh Singh Jain, president of the Central Circuit Cine Association. “Films run on word of mouth publicity. Big publicity in other forms does help, but only in the first three days. Thereafter, the film runs on merit, and merit alone.”

Hype in times of piracy
Ratan Jain
However, Ratan Jain of Venus, says that big publicity does pay. “The initial business has come to acquire greater importance because films are shown illegally on cable soon after release. We are trying to stop the cable menace but it is not in our hands alone. Under the circumstances, one has to gamble with big publicity, which pays initially at least. And if the film has merit, it pays further. A producer invests money in making a film and he has to recover that money irrespective of how the product has shaped up. He has to advertise it in a big way. Sometimes the gimmick may fail but that does not mean it should not be tried. If you don’t, pirates will take away the film’s earnings through the organised cable networks. In the case of Josh, we could control 50 per cent of the piracy. The remaining 50 per cent should have been controlled by the police but they did not. At the association level, we met the chief minister and police commissioner with a request to put an end to the cable menace, but nothing seems to be happening. In the case of Refugee, there was an initial craze for the new pair. Both were new to the audience which wanted to ascertain how they had fared in their debut film. This curiosity was further enhanced through the big publicity undertaken by the filmmaker. That explains the initial rousing reception it received at the box-office.”

money spent in vain
Shyam Shroff
“I feel that there must be self-regulation in publicity,” says Shyam Shroff. “It reminds me of Sahir’s famous poem Ek Shehenshah Ne Banwake Haseen Taj Mahal. If the king has built Taj Mahal to express his love, it doesn’t mean that the love of a poor man becomes less just because of his inability to build a Taj Mahal. Similarly, if a distributor can’t spend big money on publicity, his film doesn’t become less important. A movie can never run on publicity alone. After the 12 noon show, publicity has no value. The film runs totally on word-of-mouth publicity. I do not think big publicity pays. You should be able to collect the maximum returns by spending the minimum. That should be the criteria.”

It only boosts egos
Balkrishna Shroff
Balkrishna Shroff is in perfect agreement with his brother. “Excess publicity doesn’t pay. It is done only to satisfy the egos of stars and filmmakers,” says Balkrishna Shroff.

Hype can be
counter-productive
Ramesh Taurani
Producer Ramesh Taurani says, “Big publicity is part of the marketing strategy. For introducing any new product, people do big publicity. Every new film falls in the same category. Today, there is so much competition from the satellite channels, that your product has to reach across and inform the maximum number of people. Tips is famous for advertising its products. Whatever publicity it did for Kya Kehna has been justified by the end result. Over-publicity should be avoided because it creates too much expectation and if the film hasn’t the merit, it can be counter-productive.”

Small films are worst hit
NN SIPPY
“Publicity is needed for big films to boost them but there is a limit,” says NN Sippy, president of the Indian Motion Picture Distributors Association, and asks, “Who is spending so much money on publicity? I don’t think the distributors can afford to spend huge sums on publicity. In fact, the IMPDA had put a ceiling of 24 cm ads in daily papers with two display ads. But of late, these restrictions are not being observed because a sub-committee appointed by the IMPDA has put no bar on the publicity expenses because they feel that advertising be done according to the requirements of a film. But no matter how much publicity you do, the film runs if it has merit. High profile publicity is done only in Mumbai and not so much in places like Delhi and Calcutta where newspapers are not giving more space to film ads. There is a ceiling by the papers there. But the kind of publicity done by films like Refugee creates a problem for small producers and distributors who cannot spend that much money. In the process the small distributors are butchered.”

MSM Desai