Return of multiplexes: Box-office collections touch ₹1,500 crore in March, says report

The multiplexes, which were severely crippled during the pandemic, seem to be bouncing back as box office collections are looking up. Audiences are flocking back to theatres, the recent crop of hits such as Gangubhai Kathiawadi, RRR, Kashmir Files, KGF: Chapter 2; a boost in screen capacity and the 20 per cent hike in ticket prices have all worked in favour of multiplexes.

According to a report in a business daily, the Multiplex Association of India (MAI) has collected ₹1,500 crore in box office revenues in March, which is touted to be their best performance ever in a month.

With this kind of revenues, the industry believes it is now all set to touch box office revenues of ₹15,500 crore in FY23, even scaling its peak performance levels just before the pandemic in FY20.

Kamal Gianchandani, president of the association and also head of business strategy and planning for PVR Ltd, told Business Standard that based on these trends in March and April, the industry expected FY23 to be the best year, with overall revenues expected to hit ₹14,500-₹15,500 crore.

No growth in the last two years

The film exhibition sector saw no growth at all in the last two years and many single screens and multiplexes had to close down their shutters entirely. Nearly 1,000-1,500 single screen operators shut down but larger players like PVR and INOX managed to survive.

Also read: INOX-PVR mammoth entity leaves small filmmakers, producers worried

With only 925 screens in 2009, multiplex screens had grown to a whopping 3,200 by 2019 across India. Currently, out of the 9,500 screens across India, PVR and INOX, who recently merged, have a network of almost 1,500 screens. Carnival Cinemas and Cinepolis India follow with 450 and 417 screens, respectively.

(Incidentally, the number of screens in India remains abysmally low at 8-8.5 screens per million population compared to 37 screens per million in China and 124 in America.)

When INOX and PVR cinema merged, PVR chairman Ajay Bijli said in a press release, “The film exhibition sector has been one of the worst impacted sectors on account of the pandemic and creating scale to achieve efficiencies is critical for the long-term survival of the business and fight the onslaught of digital OTT platforms.”

Record year for industry

But, now, the tide seems to have clearly turned for multiplex owners. MAI said in the report that March has been a record year for the industry since all the screens were open with no government restrictions on capacity and movie-goers were returning in huge numbers. The numbers in April are expected to be at the same level, MAI said in the report.

Before COVID, in FY20, multiplexes had raked in ₹12,000 crore in box office revenues. After theatres were shuttered during the pandemic, box office revenues for multiplex owners plummeted to ₹3,000 crore. In FY 22, hopes were pinned on Akshay Kumar’s Sooryavanshi and with Maharashtra, which is a sizable market, starting to reopen theatres, albeit with capacity restrictions, revenues were expected to go up. But the third wave of the pandemic hit India in January and box-office revenues ended at around ₹4,500-₹5,000 crore despite a significant March performance.

Multiplex saviours: RRR and KGF-2

Besides the hike in ticket prices, the jump in capacity utilisation in movie screens by 6-7 per cent over FY20, and movies like S S Rajamouli’s RRR in March and KGF-2 in April, have helped multiplexes to get back on their feet and do roaring business. It helped that RRR raked in ₹1,133 crore in revenue across all languages, while KGF-2 (which was also dubbed in Hindi) alone made ₹1,185 crore across all languages in the domestic box office.