In Pics: OTT platforms enter theatrical distribution….

On one hand, while movie theatres are cribbing about all things – right from the time gap between the theatrical and the OTT release to OTT premieres, a Bangalore based OTT platform NET5 is venturing into the heartland theatres of India with dubbed & original version of their films in Hindi, Telugu, Tamil and other languages and that too before having it them on their platform.

Balwanth Singh COO, Net 5 is gung-ho about his idea of turning the theatrical business on its head. “How many people in small towns the B and C centres as we call them in the film trade have people who have access to OTT platforms and watch English Movies online?Barring Youtube, they do not see anything. Hence, we reckon that this is a business that can be exploited. Add to that if a film has a theatrical release, there is a bigger visibility of the films though posters and other publicity material which will help a film get only bigger,” he advocates.

Singh will be releasing the Scott Adkins film Legacy of Lies which has been dubbed into Indian Languages and will be releasingas Agent MI 6 on March 19 all over India. This will be followed soon after by another English Film “Anti Life “ in Hindi and south version toplining Hollywood superstar Bruce Willis.

Explaining the rationale of dubbing foreign movies in Hindi, Balwanth says, “We are not dubbing every film that we acquire. When we acquire, we keep in Mind the films that have commercial potential to have a big screen release and films which are very strong on content or the independent films we keep them on our platform, which are a perfect watch online, case example we have done a premiere of small independent film 8119 Miles very successfully on NET 5.

The release of Legacy of Lies ( Agent Mi 6 in Hindi)will be followed by the release of AntiLife starring Bruce Willis, a kids adventure film Adventures of Rufus and an action film 400 Bullets, “We are looking at at-least 2 movies every month for theatrical release,” says Singh.

Singh says that he sees a great future also in India theatrical market space. “India is under screened; we have about 7500 screens spread across India but the market potential is about 40,000 screens. For the kind of population India has and its passion for cinema the potential for A-lister is Rs 100 cr gross on the first day itself. We are seeing what the number of screens did for China, today Hollywood is also dependent on the China market. We should also vie for this place in the business,” he adds.