Bollywood’s entry fails to revive Lollywood

LAHORE: Despite the injection of at least half a dozen Indian films presently being shown in the Pakistan’s cinemas, a lack of a good quality local films and unchecked piracy have ruined the prospects of the revival of the ailing Pakistani film industry and cinema houses, resulting in a possible closure of over three dozen cinemas in near future. According to the Lollywood circles in Lahore, the Indo-Pak joint ventures being shown in Pakistani cinemas have failed miserably in bringing any qualitative and quantitative change in the messy state of the film industry as the experiment has completely flopped because of unchecked piracy in the country. Safdar Khan, a local cinema owner revealed that except the Indian flick Race, no other Indo-Pak co-production could make profit. Bhootnath, a recently-released co production merely brought Rs2,000 to Rs5,000 a show and this amount was split between the cinema and the distributor. Jannat, another Indian production which was being shown in two cinemas in Lahore had hardly done 15% of the desired business even though it was rated a good movie. Even a blockbuster like Amir Khan’s Taare Zamin Par failed to do business. The reason perhaps that Race worked was that it was a purely action film whereas the other films were either art or family movies. Lollywood circles say in the wake of an acute shortage of quality films, things had gone from bad to worse for Pakistani cinema owners. “The compulsions imposed on the Indian films being brought to Pakistan on the pretext of co-productions that have a strict criterion does not allow a completely commercial Indian movie to land in Pakistan. The Indian movies which we all watch in our cinemas are brought either for educational purposes or because they are a joint Indo-Pak venture. Moreover, every latest Indian movie is available at Pakistani video shops the day the movie is released in India,” these circles added.