Exclusive! MG Srinivas on Ghost’s Dasara release: How long will we give away festive dates to other industries?

Actor-filmmaker Rakshit Shetty was the first to eye the Dasara 6-day holiday for the release of his film Sapta Sagaradaache Ello’s second part on October 20. But then several others like him had the same idea and soon enough, the preceding Thursday and Friday (October 19 and 20) had several big-ticket names attached to it. From Tamil cinema there was Thalapathy Vijay’s Lokesh Kanakaraj directorial Leo, while Telugu had Ravi Teja’s Tiger Nageshwara Rao and Nandamuri Balakrishna’s Bhagavanth Kesari. In Hindi, Tiger Shroff’s Ganpath and Kangana Ranaut’s Tejas also joined this party. And then there was actor-filmmaker MG Srinivas, who, armed with an action heist thriller starring Shivarajkumar in the lead decided that he will take on this challenge and release along with Leo on October 19.

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It's a very crowded box office, even after Rakshit bowed out of this race and moved his film to a week later on October 27. What is Srinivas doing to ensure his film gets enough screens/shows for Ghost? “In a city like Bengaluru, I know that getting shows in multiplexes is going to be a major challenge. But having said that, I believe that this competition for screens and shows will only be on Day 1, after that it is about the strength of the content and the word-of-mouth publicity that has gone out about each of the films that is in theatres. By Day 2, only the film/films with good content will get the desired shows and screens, no matter how big the movie or the star in it is. We have to somehow weather the Day 1 storm, after that, I am confident that our content will speak and the tide will turn in our favour,” says the filmmaker.

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Ghost, adds Srinivas, will be in 350 screens across Karnataka, and apart from Bengaluru, maximum crowd in every other centre will be for a Kannada film. In, say, places like Hubballi, Hospete, Ballari, Davangere, Chitradurga, etc., the first preference is Kannada cinema, even if all these other films are available. The Dasara holiday is an advantage that we should capitalise on. Over the years, we have let go of all major festivals to big-ticket films from other industries. There was a time when big Kannada films would release for Sankranti, but now, we must be worried about the movies from other industries and plan our films accordingly. Whether it is Deepavali, Eid or Christmas, we have to make way for the big stars from Hindi, Tamil and Telugu. So, when are we supposed to release then? How long do we keep giving away festival dates to other films? Until and unless we are not up for the challenge, what is the point of doing good content with a star? Right now, there’s no difference between a newcomer’s film and a star vehicle – all of them plan their releases based on what is happening with the big-ticket movies from other industries. At some point, this has to change,” asserts Srinivas.

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