Business Talk With Taran Adarsh: 'Rock On' rocks

By Taran Adarsh, Bollywood Hungama News Network

I am pinching myself. Are movies actually faring well? Or am I dreaming? Or am I in a trance? First PHOONK. Now ROCK ON!!. Industry calculations and arithmetic have gone for a toss. Like I pointed on Day 1 itself, ROCK ON!! goes against the set rules of Bollywood trade.

Till a few years ago, traders would scoff and snigger at a film like ROCK ON!!. Believe me, most exhibitors wouldn't be interested in playing the film. Why, a few decades ago, ARDH SATYA, CHAKRA and even JAANE BHI DO YAARO were limited to matinee and noon shows and a handful of theatres here and there. Beyond Mumbai, it was really tough to even procure theatres.

But multiplexes have changed all that. Today, the mindset has also undergone a drastic change, a change for better. And not just viewers, even writers and directors are thinking differently.

ROCK ON!! did exceptional over the weekend at all major centres and Monday onwards, centres like Mumbai, Pune, Delhi and Bangalore reported 70% + occupancy, while mini-metros has been 30%-40%, which is favourable as well. Yes, single screens aren't encouraging, but the business at plexes more than compensates it.

The fact that an offbeat film like ROCK ON!! has worked big time at plexes only goes to show that Bollywood is slowly coming of age.

CHAMKU has been a nightmare. Forget a week of successful run, it didn't even complete 3 days at places. Shows had to be called off because of no audience. Can you believe this? Only goes to show how over-rated some actors and directors are.

So many factors went against CHAMKU. The weird title and the outdated script are two factors. Business-wise, this is Bobby's biggest flop to date. As for director Kabeer Kaushik, with two resounding flops to his credit [SEHAR, CHAMKU], he ought to pull up his socks.

C KKOMPANY's collections were a shade better than CHAMKU, but the two films have met with the same fate: Flop. Surprisingly, the industry still feels that comedies are a safe bet, although a number of comedies have proved tragedies at the box-office this year.

C KKOMPANY was funny in parts, not in totality, and if you can't keep the audience in splits till the very end, it won't work. C KKOMPANY lacked consistency and despite excellent pre-release promotion, it didn't find many takers.

As for MUKHBIIR, can we coin a new terminology for it please? Flop nahin, disaster bhi nahin, kuch naya sochiye...

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