The recently released action film Naam Hai Akira started on a slow note with a box office collection of just Rs 5.5 crores on day one. However, Sonakshi Sinha is not the sole victim of such poor numbers.
There have been films like Neerja, Piku, and Sarbjit that started at a snail’s pace, and had to rely on word of mouth for the numbers to pick up. Women-centric films with stars like Deepika Padukone and Kangana Ranaut have only opened in the Rs 5-8 crore bracket, whereas Salman Khan or Shah Rukh Khan don’t find it difficult to touch the '100 crore mark. So is the question is — are Indian audiences not going out and seeing such films?
Neeraj Gheywan, director of the award winning film Masaan thinks so. “This has to do with the deep-rooted patriarchy of our society. One doesn’t take a film seriously unless there is a male star. At least, that’s what the filmmakers think. And because women-centric films don’t generate as much money, actresses get paid less,” he explains. “Even though Deepika Padukone has broken the glass ceiling by being one of the top ten highest paid actresses in the world, her male counterparts draw twice or thrice as much,” says Gheywan.
Praveen Sattaru, the maker of Guntur Talkies has a different opinion. “Why this craze over ‘women-centric’ films now? There have been films with women as the lead ever since the camera was invented. Back then, films were not men or women centric, they were character and story oriented. If a Salman or a Shah Rukh movie is making Rs 100 crores within just a few days, it is because of their star power, not because they are male. Even Mary Kom and Tanu Weds Manu Returns did well at the box office.”
However, the director of Mary Kom does sense the bias. Omung Kumar says, “The audience feels these movies will stay in the theatres for long, and they’ll watch them later resulting in poor openings. Ultimately, it is a numbers game, so producers think twice,” he says, but is hopeful. “In one or two years, things will change as filmmakers now want to produce female-centric films and even the stars are waiting to take up such roles,” he adds.
Pradeep Sarkar, who has directed stories with strong women characters such as Mardaani and Laga Chunari Mein Daag believes that the story plays an important part in the success of a film. “When you consider movies like Bajrangi Bhaijaan and Sultan, the movies had Salman Khan, but they also had good stories. Without a seasoned star, the audience takes time to understand the story, that’s why these films take time to pick up. Women oriented subjects are picking up now. They’ll take time to gather momentum,” says Sarkar.
Sanyukta Chawla Shaikh, who wrote the dialogues for Sonam Kapoor’s Neerja thinks there are several factors that decide the success of a film. “We are an extremely male dominated audience. Movies such as Kahaani, Queen, and even Akira were made on smaller budgets compared to Salman Khan or SRK movies, which are made with Rs 100crores and also earn Rs 100 crores — the canvases are large.
The difference between how much a movie costs, and how much it earns makes a difference too. If you give the audiences a good story, they will go watch it.
They went to movies like Vicky Donor, Do Dooni Chaar — if you give them a good evening show, they will go watch your movie. However, there needs to be a bias in the way we approach female-centric movies the way we do for male actors. The stories need to be given a fair chance. They need it be treated the same way as any other movie instead of tagging them as ‘female oriented’.
There should be a set of standard parameters for the story in which you see a movie for what it is.”
