From Theatres to OTT: The Evolution and Erosion of Indian Cinema

OTT (over-the-top) media is not a new concept to us. It was not very famous before COVID-19 and the quarantine period. During COVID and the quarantine era, when cinemas were shut down, people were at home getting bored; they needed something to entertain them. Here, OTT platforms like Netflix, Amazon, HBO Max, and many more saw an opportunity to cash in.

Before that time, OTT platforms were famous in other regions like Europe and America, but South Asia was not much familiar with them. The quarantine era changed things in this region, where many films made for cinema got OTT releases, including some anticipated projects like Laxmmi Bomb (Akshay Kumar’s movie) and Ludo.

Here, Ludo got a lot of appreciation in terms of performance and story, while Laxmmi Bomb was not able to make any impact. There are obvious reasons for that, but these films and this timeline opened a gateway to a new era of the film industry. Now, many filmmakers saw a place to showcase their talent.

Bollywood uses it firmly, where now Bollywood is at the verge, where a lot of projects are made just for this platform. Also, many cinema-released movies try to get a favorable OTT deal. These deals play a vital role in theatrical hype, where the highest deal was sealed by Prabhas’s Kalki 2898 AD, priced at 375 crores INR as compared to a 600-crore budget.

Nowadays, many producers try to find a better OTT deal, which not only damages the traditional cinema and film culture of India but also the quality of production work. India was well known for its film release culture, especially in Southern Indian states. But due to OTT deals, South Indian films were limited to a 4-week minimum release, while for Northern states it’s 8 weeks.

This OTT trend is damaging South Indian film culture, where films are celebrated as tradition. Most movies just have a theatrical run for 1–3 weeks for a profitable deal. Before that, these movies had a 2–3 month run, like Magadheera, which had a record run of 1000 days.

This thing did not damage the South industry that much, as it affected the North industry. In Bollywood, many theatrical disasters became masterpieces over OTT, including movies like Lal Singh Chaddha and Khel Khel Mein. Due to this, many film producers saw it as a cash grab and focused more on it rather than on a theatrical run.

That’s the reason why people were avoiding Bollywood movies in the cinema. When you don’t advertise movies enough to grab the theater audience, how can you give the best cinema experience to fans? For instance, before COVID, Bollywood's highest grossers were around 400 crores, but after that, till 2023, the highest grosser remained under 400 crores.

Now, in the Indian film market revenue, Bollywood is at 2nd, replaced by the Telugu film industry. Just for comparison, in the top 5 highest-grossing films, only 1 Bollywood film was there, while the 2 highest-grossers of the South industry were from last year — a legitimate proof that the South industry still holds it.

While OTT brought an opportunity for films like Thumbed and Kantara Chapter 1 to become a global hit, it severely damaged the Bollywood film audience. And if Bollywood does not bring some ambitious projects, it will soon collapse.