Vikramaditya Motwane On Why Hindi Cinema Is In A Catch-22 Situation

Sitting with Anupama Chopra, Editor of Hollywood Reporter India, six of Indian independent cinema’s biggest names discussed the challenges that plague the industry. Filmmakers Vikramaditya Motwane, Rana Daggubati, Shaunak Sen, Rima Das, Chaitanya Tamhane and Payal Kapadia offered insights into how to support and showcase diverse voices.

Daggubati, noting that Malayalam cinema and pockets of Telugu and Kannada cinema are all very independent, said that very few filmmakers had broken the independent, mainstream barrier. “We’re waiting for a country-wide moment to happen,” he said.

“From a purely creative perspective on the kind of films being made, and not just going by  the filmmakers who are on this table — all of whom are incredible — it’s lovely to see the diversity and the (different) kinds of voices coming up,” said Motwane.

He, however, agreed with Daggubati’s point about there being  far greater progress being made in the South, compared to  Hindi cinema. “The Hindi-indie industry is — I don't want to say dead because that's a really strong word. But if you see where we were pre-pandemic, before streamers seemed to be the solution…” he said, pointing out that Neeraj Ghaywan’s drama Masaan (2015) had been given a theatrical release. “That’s not happening today,” he added.

The director said  that the industry was stuck in a catch-22 situation, with theatre owners blaming the rise of OTT platforms for people not going to movie halls and  streaming sites not acquiring indie films because they believed the audience wouldn't watch these online. “It’s going nowhere,” he said. “And it’s a situation that needs fixing.”

Chopra recalled a similar conversation she had had with Motwane at The Himalayan Film festivals a year ago, when he had, in fact, used the word ‘dead’ to describe Hindi-indie cinema. “You had said that perhaps the sweet spot is genre films, like Jigra (2024) or Kill (2023), which would excite people (and make them)  come into theatres,” she said. “But both those films underperformed.”

Motwane explained that when there is muscle behind a film, there’s a chance it will work at the box office. “That’s the bright spark for me now,” he said. He shared the example of Laapataa Ladies (2023), which performed well, thanks to the efforts of producers Aamir Khan and Kiran Rao, who also directed the film. “If the film is good and a distributor shows confidence in it, people will go and see it. The same applies to Kill and 12th Fail (2023) as well — that's the best example of a movie within the indie/mainstream space.”

He said that at the end of the day, it all boiled down to distribution. If producers don’t support the film, and theatres don’t allow it to run beyond the first week, how was anybody supposed to go watch it? “There are wonderful films everywhere. But how is it possible for them to take that final step to (reach) the audience?” he asked.