The Kannada movie Kurukshetra released to packed houses on August 9 and is well into its fourth week. However, a big blow for the filmmakers came in the form of Prabhas starrer Saaho, which hit theatres later in August. Saaho took over the screens that were running Kurukshetra, that too during the long Ganesh Chaturthi festival weekend. This, of course, did not go well with the makers of Kurukshetra, who allege that they have lost a major chunk of their profit.
Veteran producer Rockline Venkatesh, who is also the distributor for Kurukshetra, has been quoted by The New Indian Express as stating, “If this the case of a big film, I understand the state and the problems of other producers who have struggled to bring their film to theatres.”
He has also given a solution to this problem. He said, “There is a way to curb this situation, for which we need the interference of the state government, and a cap on the ticket prices.”
“Last week, they encashed Saaho, next it might be Sye Raa Narasimha Reddy. When a film in another language has a houseful show in Bengaluru, the high ticket pricing enables the exhibitors to earn a profit that is three times that of a Kannada film. The only way to curb this is to put a cap on the ticket pricing,” he added.
Kurukshetra, which is directed by Naganna, is a mythological drama in which Darshan plays Duryodhana. The film also has the late star Ambareesh, Arjun Sarja, Sonu Sood, V Ravichandran, Bharathi Vishnuvardhan, Sneha, Hariprriya, Meghana Raj and P Ravi Shankar in pivotal roles. Inspired by the poem Gadhayuddha, penned by the Kannada poet Ranna, the screenplay for the film was written by JK Bharavi. The film has an impressive technical crew as well. Jayanan Vincent has cranked the camera for this film with Jo Ni Harsha doing the editing.
(Content provided by Digital Native)