It is a myth that multiple film releases on the same day hurt the producer. I reached to the conclusion after a bit of research on the history of such releases in the past.
After I wrote the news about the two new and highly awaited movies – Anmol KC’s ‘Kri’ and Shweta Khadka’s ‘Kanchhi’ releasing on the same day for the Valentine Day of 2018, I thought about the benefits and loss to the producers by such releases. Apart from my personal analysis the research on the history of film releases also supported the notion that – good films are successful no matter how many films release on that day. Bad films don’t get any viewers even if they get solo-release slots.
Before I go deep in case studies, here is a video report on the issue:
Case Study – ‘Loot’: I was wrong
Nepali movie ‘Loot’ was released on Friday the 13th of January, 2012 with three other movies. In the film-release report I wrote at that time, I wrote,”There simply aren’t enough Nepali movie lovers to watch more than one new movie in theatres.”
Well, I was wrong!
Out of ‘Loot’, ‘Bazar’, ‘Sadak’ and ‘Masti’ there weren’t much viewers for the three of them, except the super-hit Kathmandu urban crime story movie. Before the release of the movie, almost every movies were flop for more than a year. The movie broke the trend and saved the industry from being declared the emergency situation. I wrote, “it is good to know that Nepali movie market has grown so big that it can handle 4 different movies on a single week!”
The movie ‘Loot’ didn’t have any star artists, the director was new and the actors were new at that time. Saugat Malla and Dayahang Rai were noticed after the movie. The competing movies all had superstars of that time – Rekha Thapa and Aayush Rijal; Rajesh Hamal and Arunima Lamsal; and Nikhil Upreti with Jenisha KC.
[Read the Friday Release report here.]
Case Study – Kabaddi and November Rain
If you think the 2012 release was an exception, there were two movies released on the same day on April 25 of 2014. One of them featured Aryan Sigdel with Namrata Shrestha and another featured Dayahang Rai with a new actress. They both were made on good stories and the viewers found them interesting. The result – both ‘Kabaddi’ and ‘November Rain’ were successful movies despite of being of same genre and releasing on the same day.
Another biggest release of the year 2014, ‘Kohinoor’ of Shree Krishna Shrestha and Shweta Khadka was also released with another movie ‘Shisha’.
[Read the Friday Release report of November Rain and Kabaddi || [Read the Friday Release report of Kohinoor and Shisha.]]
Case Study – Classic and Prem Geet
Now, in the Valentine Day of 2016, three movies were released on the same day – ‘Chalechha Batas Sustari’, ‘Prem Geet’ and ‘Classic’. All three movies were love story movies and they were competing each other.
The result – two of them became the biggest hit of the year and the third flopped. I don’t believe any movie had been negatively affected by the other because, viewers know which one is a good movie and which one is not.
Conclusion
After the analysis of these three cases from 2012, 2014 and 2016 and analyzing some of the solo-release movies, I come to the conclusion that it is a myth to say that good movies are affected by other movies whether they are released on the same day or other days.
In some cases, they surely get less theatre to start with and the initial business might be affected. But, in a long term – good movies don’t need to be solo release to be successful.
With this, I wish ‘Kanchhi’ and ‘Kri’ success.