One shouldn't pull the thread to its breaking point. But here the filmmakers did so by increasing the budgets of their films by paying exorbitant pay checks to the big heroes.
The desire to earn big in small time has spread its wings among all the heroes. But all such big films have been biting the mud at the box office.
Coming to Hindi films, Bachchan Pandey and Prithviraj were the high budget films which were made with more than Rs 200 Cr each. But both of them could recover only Rs 50- Rs 60 Cr in net collection.
But 'The Kashmir Files' that was made at a budget less than Rs 20 Cr could make a net collection of Rs 250 Cr only at the box office. Similar analysis can be applied to 'Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2' which was made at Rs 50 Cr but collected Rs 185 Cr till date.
Here is the economic theory. Though the small budget films fail to earn much at the box office, their chance of recovery is better when compared to that of high budget films.
The OTT rights and the humble theatrical collection may be enough for good small budget films in order to recover the costs and make a reasonable profit.
Shariq Patel, the chief business officer of ZEE Studios said recently that their OTT platform has a portfolio strategy to invest in small Rs 10 Cr films as well as mid range Rs 30- 40 Cr ones but not all the big ones.
The recent film Janhit Mein Jaari came up with some expectations but collected less than Rs 5 Crore two weeks. Still it could make the break even with a marginal profit much before its release by selling the non theatrical rights. While the entire cost of production including print and publicity was Rs 20 Cr, by selling all sorts of non theatrical rights it made Rs 23 Cr and a subsidy of Rs 2 Cr was also given by Madhya Pradesh government for the kind of content in it.
The same applies to the South Indian films as well. Not every film can mint collections leaving rare exceptions. So, for the wellbeing of the producers, the big heroes may have to downsize themselves to mid range for better returns to the producers.