The Impact of Corporatisation in Hindi movies

Abstract:
With a rich heritage of more than a hundred years, the Indian film industry, with the Hindi film industry (Bollywood) at its focal point, is continuously evolving to adapt to the changing demands of its audience. With its ‘industry’ accord in place since 2000, abetted by an open economy facilitating business, there couldn’t have been a period as strategic as this for the involvement of corporate entities in Bollywood. This article aims to discuss, by virtue of cogent reasoning via suitable examples derived from the rich history of Bollywood, the various pros & cons associated with the corporatisation of Hindi movies and whether it really is a game-changer or not.
Corporatisation of Hindi Movies: Game Changer or Just Hype?
The kaleidoscopic world of Indian cinema, with the Hindi film industry (Bollywood) at its cynosure, has continued to enthral its audiences across the globe for more than a hundred years and can undoubtedly be counted as the only bona fide passion sans cricket which binds every section of the Indian society ranging from the hinterlands to the urban/semi-urban centres. In these hundred years, the film ecosystem has followed a deep learning curve to mutate into its current form (Exhibit 1) of a gigantic industry with ever-increasing revenues (Exhibit 2), churning out close to a thousand movies every year. Being recognized as an ‘industry’ ushered in one of the most critical revolutions in Bollywood: ‘corporatisation’, i.e. the involvement of corporate institutions in the different stages of film production. But has this change really augured well for Bollywood?
Although primarily characterized by the domination of behemoth studios like the Bombay Studios in its early days, Bollywood gradually evolved into a system dominated by ‘star power’ with the arrival of the Dev-Dilip-Raj triumvirate. Thus, the studio system, which was characterized by actors being on the studio’s payroll, completely collapsed and the ‘stars’ could literally dictate the terms in any movie that they would appear in starting from the fees they would charge to the script of the movie. This shift also engendered the rise of independent producers and thereby, several malfeasant practices pertaining to the financing of movies including the involvement of the underworld. Furthermore, all the work was done primarily based on word-of-mouth with very minimal contractual framework to monitor operations. This lax attitude led to several instances involving non-payment of fees and several performers taking steps to circumvent these risks, for ex. Kishore Kumar would reportedly not sing even a single line before receiving his full payment. There have also been many cases wherein movies would get shelved after a considerable amount of shooting had been done just due to a paucity of funds. Furthermore, as many leading actors like Guru Dutt and Raj Kapoor would use their personal funds to fund their projects, they were exposed to an ocean of uncertainty and had to even face severe financial crunches when their magnum opuses did not perform well. Thus, the conditions were quite ripe at the turn of the millennium for the introduction of institutional investments in Hindi movies after Bollywood was accorded ‘industry’ status.
One of the most important pros associated with the introduction of “corporate institutional investments in Hindi movies”, a concept which ABCL wanted to implement extensively before undergoing bankruptcy, was the sheer sense of order which they brought to the erstwhile high-entropy Bollywood industry as the movie-making process is now covered by extensive & uniform legal documentation. A significant reduction in the risks associated with film financing, due to the pre-selling of movies before release, has resulted in actors drawing fatter pay-cheques as well. In fact, the compensation structure of an actor has become very flexible as several stars have even decided to forego any fees and agree to a profit sharing of the movie’s revenues; a trend started by Aamir Khan. Thus, a better pay structure ensures that actors need not work on several movies simultaneously unlike in the past whereby they may concentrate on a quality rather than quantity. The script, definitely the lynchpin of any movie, is now fixed as per legal contracts even before shooting commences due to which shooting has been significantly streamlined. All these factors have greatly abetted in an intensive mitigation of the roadblocks associated with making movies due to which the average time needed to complete a movie has been appreciably reduced. In addition to all these points, formalized capital institutional investments have put a halt on the inflow of “black money” into movies, many instances of which went on to grab the headlines due to the involvement of major underworld figures in them. The examples of the same are innumerable, with the Gulshan Kumar murder case (1997) and the death-threats received by Rakesh Roshan (1999-2000) at the very fore of this list. In fact, many trade pundits go on to suggest than an increasing rate of occurrence of such incidents towards the turn of the millennium was instrumental in expedient policy-making to accord the film fraternity ‘industry’ status as soon as possible. The move has tangibly ameliorated the intrusion of the underworld in Hindi cinema as no movie has been levelled with the charges of being financed by such ignominious entities since the Bharat Shah-produced “Chori Chori Chupke Chupke” (2001), where Chhota Shakeel was supposedly the person who was really responsible for pumping money.
Although all the arguments made thus far do tend to pontificate that corporatisation proved to be the proverbial panacea for the issues plaguing Bollywood, a look at the other side of the coin is definitely warranted at this stage. Corporate entities often have a very algorithmic approach while approaching any project due to which they tend to go more by facts/figures than anything else. Thus, they often face issues pertaining to working in an integrated manner with people from the film industry as movies have a very huge qualitative aspect to them and it becomes impossible to develop a deterministic model to predict whether a movie will work or not. Thus, in a bid to minimize the degree of uncertainty associated with their investments, corporate entities often tend to interfere in the activities of the creative units which often lead to irreconcilable fall-outs. Several noted producers & directors like Shekhar Kapoor and Mukesh Bhatt have gone on record to state that they will make a conscious effort to abstain from corporatisation as they feel that the involvement of corporate entities would gravely stifle creative juices. The ever-increasing influence of piracy in Hindi movies also poses a potential threat to the efficacy of corporatisation.
Set to grow at a projected compounded Y-on-Y rate of 15%, the current phase is extremely interesting for Bollywood as easily availability of corporate credit has engendered a space where strong-themed art films can coexist with massy potboilers. The steadfast leaps undertaken by the industry, fuelled by corporatisation, has also enabled it to gain considerable prominence on the international scale with several Hindi movies attracting considerable attention from not only the international audience but also major global production houses like Warner Bros. & Fox Entertainment Inc. Therefore, movie marketing has truly proliferated as a distinctive keynote in the current framework. Thus, corporatisation, though not devoid of its fair share of flaws, is definitely the way going forward and will surely evolve with the onset of time to yield even more munificent returns for Bollywood.

Exhibit No. 1: Changing dynamics of Bollywood over the decades (Source: IMaCS Research)

Bibliography:
[1] Thussu, Daya Kishan, "Hollywood 's Poorer Cousin--Indian Cinema in an Era of Globalization", Asian Cinema 13.1 (2002): 17-26.
[2] Wankhade, Gaurav R, "Film Financing in Bollywood Scripting a New Saga, Screening an Extravaganza", Screening an Extravaganza (April 15, 2009)(2009)
[3] Ramachandran, J., and Sourav Mukherji, "Creating a successful cultural product: Interview with Raju Hirani", IIMB Management Review 22.4 (2010): 165-172.
[4] “Corporatisation of Indian film industry: A report on the corporatisation of the Indian film industry and the impact of corporatisation”, India Brand Equity Foundation (IBEF) (2013)
[5] Website: http://www.boxofficeindia.co.in/corporatisation-of-films-makes-economic-sense-amitabh-bachchan/

Bibliography: [1] Thussu, Daya Kishan, "Hollywood 's Poorer Cousin--Indian Cinema in an Era of Globalization", Asian Cinema 13.1 (2002): 17-26. [2] Wankhade, Gaurav R, "Film Financing in Bollywood Scripting a New Saga, Screening an Extravaganza", Screening an Extravaganza (April 15, 2009)(2009) [3] Ramachandran, J., and Sourav Mukherji, "Creating a successful cultural product: Interview with Raju Hirani", IIMB Management Review 22.4 (2010): 165-172. [4] “Corporatisation of Indian film industry: A report on the corporatisation of the Indian film industry and the impact of corporatisation”, India Brand Equity Foundation (IBEF) (2013) [5] Website: http://www.boxofficeindia.co.in/corporatisation-of-films-makes-economic-sense-amitabh-bachchan/