With each passing year, the excitement among audiences to come to theatres is coming down. The cinema culture still exists in the Telugu states, but with the change in audience tastes and the evolution of a new generation, the theatre culture is not attracting the right mindset. Usually, Summer is considered to be a good season for the box office as the children will have holidays and they will be interested in catching up films on the big screen. But, 2025 Summer is so boring that not a single film made it big.
We are almost inching towards the end of May, but so far, there is no single hit this month. The month-end will witness the release of Bhairavam, and it is not carrying a unanimous positive buzz. The big reason for this slump is the absence of big stars in the box office race. Pawan Kalyan alone will be seen this season with Hari Hara Veera Mallu, releasing next month. Apart from him, there is Nagarjuna who will shine in Kubera by June month ending.
In reality, when a big star is not seen regularly on the screen, the movie going habit of the audiences will also get hampered. When the stars do films regularly, it becomes a habit for viewers and in the process, in the absence of stars, they would prefer watching a film made with unknown faces or less budget. Gone are those days which are now replaced with the urge to wait for the film to be released on OTT platforms.
The pov of producers and the film industry folks is that the IPL season contributed to the losses, followed by the absence of big stars.
However, the actual reality is that the damage caused by IPL is negligible. In the case of the Telugu states, the home team Sun Risers Hyderabad failed utterly from the beginning of the season itself. All other top performing teams like CSK also put a flop show, resulting in people genuinely losing interest in the tournament. The absence of big stars is one reason but other issues are the ticket prices, F&B prices at multiplexes, and the 4-week OTT window which are preventing from people to step into theatres.
Until and unless the film industry focuses on setting the ticket prices and striking favourable deals with OTT platforms, the issue of less foot-falls will continue at theatres and it may even get worse in the coming days.
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