Ponmagal Vandhal OTT release: Theater owners and producers at loggerheads

The Tamil Nadu theatre owners association and some of the producers are at loggerheads over the straight-to-digital premiere of Jyotika’s Ponmagal Vandhal on Amazon Prime Video in the first week of May.

Good move by @2D_ENTPVTLTD .. I appreciate and support.. Bcoz it will create a new path for small budget films.. But this way is not suitable for big budget films.. So theatre owners no need to worry in this issue.. https://t.co/xMc15zNocS

— Cheran (@directorcheran) April 25, 2020

It all started when R Panneer Selvam, The General Secretary of the Tamil Nadu Theatre and Multiplex Owners Association, who also owns the popular Rohini Theaters in Chennai, posted a video saying that they will boycott Suriya and his production house 2D Entertainment’s upcoming films including Soorarai Pottru. 

Now, some of the producers have joined hands to support the decision of Suriya since it would help a lot of low-budget and mid-budget films if they premiere directly on streaming platforms.

Statement

“Film production is a challenging field with the high risk involved. Many producers are making films with a lot of passion and confidence. Among them, challenges faced by small and medium film producers is high. Even if they have completed a film, they face many difficulty to release them especially to get theatres and shows to recover their investment through theatrical rights. This kind of challenge is not there for big budget or big artiste films. With the development of OTT (Over the Top) technology, many new films started coming out worldwide directly in this platform. Post the lockdown due to Corona in the country, many OTT platforms have started acquiring small and medium budget films for direct OTT premiere, which we all have to welcome wholeheartedly. Already film producers in Hindi, Telugu and other languages are trying to sell their films for Direct OTT premiere in order to somehow recover their investment. If small and medium budget films get premiered through OTT, the number of such films waiting to release in theatres shall reduce. The balance films can release properly too. Like that there are so many benefits we can enjoy by allowing the OTT premiere of small-medium budget films and hence this step by OTT players must be welcomed by all of us. We must request OTT players to acquire many small and medium budget films, which are struggling to release or stuck due to this lock down.

In addition, a Film Producer who has invested his money, has all the right to exploit his film in every
possible way by selling the rights available for his film, to recover his investment so that he or she
can continue in the film business.

For the film industry to operate smoothly, the three key stakeholders (producers, distributors and
theatre owners) must work together in unison and take decisions in the best interest of the industry.
We strongly request that no individual film trade association should take any decision and announce
it unilaterally, which may hurt the interest of a film producer, who is trying to protect his business.
We also request that, once this lockdown due to Corona is lifted, all the stakeholders and office
bearers of all associations must meet, discuss and arrive at a feasible solution for all the issues
before us, including on OTT release of new films, for the benefit and welfare of Tamil film industry.
Looking for the Unity of Tamil Film Industry.”

The above statement was signed by Director Bharathirajaa, T.G. Thyagarajan, K. Muralidharan, T. Siva, K.S. Srinivasan, K. Rajan, K.E. Gnanavel Raja, Lyca Tamil Kumaran, H. Murali, K. Vijayakumar, Chitra Lakshmanan, S.S. Durairaj, FEFSI Shiva, YNOT S. Sashikanth, G. Dhananjayan, S.R. Prabhu, Rajasekar Pandian, JSK Satish Kumar, C.V. Kumar, S. Lakshman, Sudhan Sundaram, Suresh Kamatchi, Director Manobala, Director Pandiraj, S. Nandagopal, Director Manoj Kumar, Panju Subbu, Radha Ravi, Auraa Cinemaa Mahesh, R.K. Suresh, Vinod Kumar, P.S. Raghunathan, Libra Ravindran, P. Ranganathan, M.S. Murugaraj,Dr. Prabhu Thilak, ‘Guinness’ Babu Ganesh, Madurai Selvam, Punch Bharath and many Film Producers.