Exclusive: Kunal Kohli reveals why he took a dig at B'wood after Baahubali success

a isn’t unexpected news. Going by the success of the first film in the Baahubali franchise, the second instalment was bound to see a good release. With the film climbing the box office’s ladder of success rapidly, what exactly it is that made the film an instant favourite of fans worldwide, eventually crossing the gross of Rs 1,000 crore worldwide?

Kunal Kohli has a theory. On Sunday, the filmmaker took to Twitter to take a dig at Bollywood’s obsession with marketing movies on television. Pointing out that none of Baahubali’s stars or the crew made an appearance on any reality or comedy shows to “make an a** of themselves doing silly things and answering silly questions[sic]”

When contacted, the Fanaa director explains that he doesn’t see any correlation between the film and the shows Bollywood stars go on to promote their upcoming movies. “What has a singing reality show or a comedy show got to do with the premise of the film? Is the film based on any of these themes, is the film about any of these shows?” he questions. He believes that promotional gimmicks such as these do not help the film gain an audience. “After Baahubali 2, look at Aamir Khan’s Dangal, these two films are the biggest hits in the recent past, and both the films did not feel the need to promote their films — they did this well solely based on merit,” he explains.

To reiterate his point, the filmmaker even points out a few more films that did well at the box office only credit their merit and not the marketing of it.

“Queen, both the Munna Bhai films, Kahaani — all these films didn’t open to great collections on their day one. But grew on to become blockbusters,” he remarks.

However, the standard business in the industry assumes that the promotion gimmicks make or break a film. A case of exception was Baahubali 2, whose content and story line itself was enough to get the fans coming from all over the country, according to Kunal. The film has crossed the gross of ' 1,000 worldwide.
While film historian SMM Ausaja, agrees that films work only on merit, he also thinks that these gimmicks do manage to gain the film an audience. “People who are affected by the film’s promotional tactics show up only on the first day of collection. After that, the only thing that takes the film ahead is the storyline and the merit,” he explains.