A vaccinated and unmasked America has returned to movie theatres, A slew of post-lockdown hits in May A Quiet Place 2, Cruella, Fast& Furious 9 , The Conjuring—have put a smile back on the faces of American movie distributors.
And now,with the second wave of Corona nearing an end in India too, and movie theatres looking at unlocking , one hears that several of the long-pending biggies which were contemplating a straight-to-OTT release, including Rohit Shetty’s Sooryavanshi, Kabir Khan’s ’83 , Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Gangubai Kathiawadi and Advait Chandan’s Lalsingh Chadha have gone back to the original plan of theatre releases.
According to reliable sources even Bell Bottom the next Akshay Kumar release, whose producers were in serious negotiations for a straight-to-digital release, has decided to return to the movie theatre.
One of the producers from the made-for-theatre projects awaiting release told me, “Don’t quote me on this. But right now this over-optimism, about returning to movie theatres, may prove shortlived. You never know which way this unpredictable pandemic will swing. But yes , with the second wave on the wane we are looking at the possibility of a theatre release with a window of 30-40 days before releasing on OTT. In the US Cruella was released in both theatres and on digital simultaneously, and it’s hit. Why not the same release model in India?”
