MUMBAI: After almost one month of washing their dirty linen in public, national multiplex chains and Hindi film producers and distributors will be meeting mid-next week for a formal round of discussions over revenue sharing terms.
It may be recalled that the two parties have not had formal discussions for over four weeks now and hence most big producers have held on to the release of their films. As was already reported by Businessofcinema.com, producers have asked multiplex chains to revert with their plan.
On the other hand, key members of the United Producers and Distributors Forum held an informal meeting yesterday at Yash Raj Studios to take stock of the current situation.
In case matters are resolved next week between the two parties, promotions of new movies slated for release can begin only early May across television. While big movies like Kambakht Ishq, Kaminey and Love Aaj Kal require a promotion window of at least six – eight weeks, the window for smaller films is at least four weeks. Keeping this in mind, even if matters are resolved by next week, the first medium or big budget movie can hit theatres only by May end or mid-June. That leaves the multiplexes with almost another month of no fresh content.
However if the stalemate continues, while it will be tough for the multiplexes to bear operating costs, even producers will have to think of alternate release strategies to ensure a wide release for their content in order to recover costs.
