Bollywood Mantra For 2017 Now - Forget All About Egos, Stop Clashes And Focus On Entertainment

In Part I of this series (Bollywood does better than 2016 in first half of 2017 - Is that good enough?) I spoke about outcome so far. This was followed by Part II (Bollywood eyes second half of 2017 to restore credibility) where I spoke about the most reliable actors of them all. Third part (Bollywood has hopes hinging on women power and content in the second half of 2017) was about women-centric films promising a better outcome and now in the concluding Part IV, I wish to reiterate the 'mantra' that could well help Bollywood come out of the lows that it has been facing and concentrate on factors that truly matter.

Let go of the ego

The first thing that the industry needs to look at right away is the ego factor. Clashes have never helped any filmmaker. Time and again one gives an example of a Lagaan/Gadar or a Welcome/Taare Zameen Par. However for God's sake that was ages back; today clashes help nobody. We saw so much money being lost in last two such instances - Ae Dil Hai Mushkil v/s Shivaay and then Raees v/s Kaabil. Every film did at least 25-30 crore lesser (even at a conservative scale) than what it actually have gained. There are 52 Fridays out there, let is pick a suitable Friday, plan backwards and then let content do the talking.

Any Friday is a good Friday for a good film

As long as your film has good content, it will work regardless of which of the 52 Fridays of the year does it hit the screens. Baahubali 2 [Hindi] has shown that. It arrived on a regular Friday and still did 500 crore+, right? Before that it had happened for Baahubali - The Beginning as well. It arrived right after Bajrangi Bhaijaan and still went past the 100 crore mark. This year too Jolly LLB 2 and Badrinath Ki Dulhania arrived on regular Fridays and entered the 100 Crore Club. The films were good and were lapped up pronto. This will happen for upcoming Fridays as well.

Thankfully, the change has begun

The good news is that the change has already begun, even if in small measures. Shah Rukh Khan has taken the first step by avoiding conflict with Akshay Kumar's Toilet - Ek Prem Katha. A very intelligent decision as now it would be arriving a week earlier and get a massive release for itself, something that was impossible on a clash. Barring Diwali [Golmaal Again, Secret Superstar], there is no major clash for any of the remaining Fridays of the year. Be it Munna Michael, Mubarakan, A Gentleman, Baadshaho, Judwaa 2, Ittefaq, Padmavati, Parmanu - The Pokhran Story or Tiger Zinda Hai - all are arriving solo. Good indeed!

Let's begin to plan for 2018 right away

While all of this has been about the films that have already been commissioned, it is time to pause, sit back, relax and take a rejuvenated approach around what to make next. First and foremost what needs to be acknowledged is the fact that filmmaking can no more be about putting together 'projects'. Enough losses have already been exhibited where stars have come first, scripts have come in later and then production has just been woven around keeping in mind the calculations over excel spreadsheets. However, pick one Hindi Medium and you get to see how films can work even without such mathematics coming into play!

So here is keeping fingers crossed and looking forward to much more exciting times ahead in Bollywood!

- Joginder Tuteja