Plot thickens: Producers accuse exhibitors of malpractices
Even as exhibitors demand an increased share of proceeds, producers accuse some of them of malpractices.
It is in the name of income share that the Kerala Film Producers Association and Kerala Film Exhibitors’ Federation started fighting and went on to halt the release of new films. And six films, including Mohanlal’s Munthirivallikal Thalirkumbol, Prithviraj’s Ezra, Dulquer Salmaan’s Jomonte Suvisheshangal and Jayasurya-starrer Fukri, which were charted to release on Christmas, turned victims of the strike. Though the government convened meetings with the office-bearers of both the film bodies, no solution has so far emerged.
The latest buzz is that the government has initiated a vigilance inquiry against Liberty Basheer, president of Kerala Film Exhibitor’s Federation, following a report handed over to it by head of State Cultural Workers’ Welfare Fund Board P. Sreekumar. “We have got a movie ticket worth Rs 80 issued from his theatre.
“And they have punched a seal of ' 100 on it. That itself is illegal. Along that, we could not see cess marked on that ticket,” Sreekumar tells DC. He adds that the inquiry is on.
A producer, who prefers anonymity, adds, “This is not an isolated incident. A section of theatres affiliated to the exhibitor’s federation is creating fake documents to loot money from their collection. Some of them make double DCR (daily collection report), when some others issue tickets with duplicate seal marks so that they needn’t file tax for tickets without official seals. That is also a profit for them. In the meantime, they show the number of ‘sold’ original tickets in the DCR, in order to say that the show is a ‘hold over’.” “According to the agreement with producers and exhibitors, if at least 85 per cent of tickets from four shows is not sold, then that film is termed ‘hold over’. Producers have to give the exhibitors more share for ‘hold over’ shows. Another fact is that many producers have given the collection amount to many exhibitors, even for many super hit movies.”
When contacted, Tomichan Mulakupadam, producer of Mollywood’s first 100 crore club movie Pulimurugan, admits that some theatres haven’t still handed over the collection to him. “Some theatres have not given me the collection of around 3-4 weeks. In the meantime, I have managed to collect money from many theatres saying that I won’t give them film for the following week if they failed to hand over the previous week’s collection.”
A source from the industry tells that exhibitors are ready to give advance payment for big films from other languages which they release during the strike period. “They are paying one week’s share in advance to those producers even before the release. So they have to release it on time. In the meantime, Malayalam producers aren’t collecting advance share from theatres for the past four years. Naturally, they give priority to release films from other languages than those from Malayalam,” says the source.
Kerala Film Producers Association president G. Suresh Kumar says that they are still not ready to increase the share for exhibitors. “We will continue the strike until they agree to follow the ongoing 60:40 share. There is no point in increasing the share for theatres. Many theatres are running in profit as around 22 hit movies were screened in theatres in 2016 alone. Though they are safer than producers, they are demanding more share; we cannot agree with that,” he says.