The prolonged closure of movie theatres during the covid-19 pandemic has robbed the box office of collections of around Rs 580 crore from the release of 26 Hindi films directly on video streaming platforms since March 2020, according to a recent report by media consulting firm Ormax. These figures have been arrived at after the entertainment tax deduction. Conceived initially as theatrical releases, the films that had no option but to premiere on OTT (over-the-top) streaming services included titles such as Gulabo Sitabo, Laxmii, Coolie No.1, Ludo, Gunjan Saxena- The Kargil Girl and several others. Ten of these titles, including Salman Khan’s Radhe- Your Most Wanted Bhai, Akshay Kumar’s Laxmii, Varun Dhawan’s Coolie No.1, and Alia Bhatt’s Sadak 2, are estimated to have contributed 76 per cent to the Rs. 580 crore loss calculated.
Ormax used its methodology to arrive at this figure based on how such films performed earlier, keeping in mind extraneous variables such as clash with other releases, holidays and even the Indian Premier League. They used benchmarks data of movies similar in terms of themes and star cast etc.
Presuming 50 per cent of the entire Rs 580 crore would go to exhibitors, from the producers’ perspective, the estimated loss at the domestic box office stands at about Rs 290 crore, Ormax said, with an additional loss of about Rs. 40 crore having been considered from what could have been overseas box office collections. This does not account for Radhe, which did manage release in certain overseas territories. That takes the total estimated box office loss at the producer end to Rs 330 crore.