Rano
VIP
MUMBAI: Big things are happening to movies aaj kal. They’re getting smaller. Make that shorter. Time was when Raj Kapoor's blockbuster 'Sangam' (at 238 minutes) had two intervals and still worked. Of course today's multiplex audience has neither the time nor the patience to sit through a magnum opus of that kind. Plus it just makes so much more sense, commercially, to keep a movie short.
Little wonder then, that even a filmmaker like Rakesh Roshan — known to make 2.5-3 hour films — has decided to trim the length of his upcoming venture. ‘Kites’, starring Hrithik Roshan, will be just about 2 hours long for its all-India release. "And the international version is even shorter at an hour-and-a-half, says the director," adding, "The audience has neither the time or the inclination to sit through a longer film."
These days the international release of a movie brings in the big bucks. Keeping that in mind, Karan Johar (famous for his long emotional dramas) has shortened the length of ‘My Name Is Khan’ (MNIK) by 45 minutes before its release in Germany, Poland, France, North America and Russia. "MNIK was shortened to fit the commercial parameters of world art house cinemas," says Johar. "We need to drop the indulgence and make way for tautness," adds the man who gave us the 3.5-hour-long ‘Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham’.
With multiplexes came multiple movies, back-to-back, in theatres half the size of what they used to be.
Interestingly, almost all such movies have recovered their costs. ‘‘The cut off point for movies these days has become 2 hours and 10 minutes,’’ says Ram Mirchandani, CEO, Eros International. ‘‘A shorter film means you can get more shows at a multiples, which translates into better revenue.’’
Siddharth Roy Kapur, CEO of UTV backs that argument. ‘‘Commercial constraint is a big reason for the movies getting shorter,’’ he says. ‘‘If the duration is about 2 hours and 10 minutes, you can get extra shows, but if the length of the film is slightly longer, then you’re sub-optimising the potential of the film at the box office,’’ Kapur adds. So how much does the length of a film figure in the initial discussions the studio has with its directors? ‘‘It’s definitely top of mind at the time when the screenplay is written but one cannot generalise,’’ says Kapur. ‘‘Cinema is a creative field. A lot also depends on the genre of the film — a saga, mythological or historical cannot be made in 2 hours.’’
Getting your film on the festival circuit is another reason why producers and directors like to keep it short. Actor-director Aamir Khan, who starred in the really long ‘Ghajini’ (2 hours, 45 mins), has just produced ‘Peepli Live’, a 104-minute film on the farmers of Madhya Pradesh that is Bollywood’s first ever entry into the Sundance Film Festival.
Little wonder then, that even a filmmaker like Rakesh Roshan — known to make 2.5-3 hour films — has decided to trim the length of his upcoming venture. ‘Kites’, starring Hrithik Roshan, will be just about 2 hours long for its all-India release. "And the international version is even shorter at an hour-and-a-half, says the director," adding, "The audience has neither the time or the inclination to sit through a longer film."
These days the international release of a movie brings in the big bucks. Keeping that in mind, Karan Johar (famous for his long emotional dramas) has shortened the length of ‘My Name Is Khan’ (MNIK) by 45 minutes before its release in Germany, Poland, France, North America and Russia. "MNIK was shortened to fit the commercial parameters of world art house cinemas," says Johar. "We need to drop the indulgence and make way for tautness," adds the man who gave us the 3.5-hour-long ‘Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham’.
With multiplexes came multiple movies, back-to-back, in theatres half the size of what they used to be.
Interestingly, almost all such movies have recovered their costs. ‘‘The cut off point for movies these days has become 2 hours and 10 minutes,’’ says Ram Mirchandani, CEO, Eros International. ‘‘A shorter film means you can get more shows at a multiples, which translates into better revenue.’’
Siddharth Roy Kapur, CEO of UTV backs that argument. ‘‘Commercial constraint is a big reason for the movies getting shorter,’’ he says. ‘‘If the duration is about 2 hours and 10 minutes, you can get extra shows, but if the length of the film is slightly longer, then you’re sub-optimising the potential of the film at the box office,’’ Kapur adds. So how much does the length of a film figure in the initial discussions the studio has with its directors? ‘‘It’s definitely top of mind at the time when the screenplay is written but one cannot generalise,’’ says Kapur. ‘‘Cinema is a creative field. A lot also depends on the genre of the film — a saga, mythological or historical cannot be made in 2 hours.’’
Getting your film on the festival circuit is another reason why producers and directors like to keep it short. Actor-director Aamir Khan, who starred in the really long ‘Ghajini’ (2 hours, 45 mins), has just produced ‘Peepli Live’, a 104-minute film on the farmers of Madhya Pradesh that is Bollywood’s first ever entry into the Sundance Film Festival.
