Kantara on OTT: Release date announcements are wrong; we will inform, says Hombale Films’ Karthik Gowda

In the four weeks since Rishab Shetty’s Kantara came out, the question on everyone’s mind has been – when will it come on OTT? This, reckon fans, is not because they have not caught the ‘divine blockbuster’ on the big screen. Instead, it is for multiple viewings of the film that’s been universally loved. For a select few, the demand for an OTT release is because they have not been able to watch the film yet as it was not available in the region they live at.

The film’s title credits had details of the digital partner. Amazon Prime Video had scooped up the right prior to theatrical release, prompting industry insiders to speculate that the deal was for on or after 30 days from release. As such it was deduced that November 4 would be the most likely date, so as not to disrupt the theatrical release of the late Power Star Puneeth Rajkumar’s docu-drama, Gandhada Gudi, which is coming out on October 28, on the occasion of his first death anniversary.

However, following the stupendous success of Kantara at the box office, despite coming out only in Kannada, the makers are believed to have come to an understanding with Prime Video to defer this. In fact, the team was planning to dub the film into other languages only for the OTT release, but given the huge demand from across the country, this process had to be advanced, with the Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam versions coming out two-three weeks later.

The film is still running riot at the box office everywhere it has been released, which then brought up the question whether Prime Video would, after all, release the film on its platform but on rental basis only, so as to make it available to those who have not had access yet. While this is still a possibility, a little while ago, Karthik Gowda, executive producer at Hombale Films and co-founder KRG Studios and KRG Connects, took to Twitter to clarify that the OTT release date of Kantara has not been decided yet. Responding to a tweet by an industry tracking handle that the film is coming to OTT on November 4, he wrote, “Wrong news! We will let you know when it is coming out, but definitely not on Nov 4.”

While that is a bit of disappointing news, it goes to show that the makers are determined to give the film its full due at the box office.