Day and Date release is a Hollywood term where a movie is made available to audience via more than one distribution channel.
Recently some of the Telugu movie makers have adopted this strategy to release their movies online on the same day they are released in theatres in India.
A few examples are – Venkat’s Case No.666/2013, Prakash Raj’s Gouravam, Neelima Tirumala setti’s Alias Janaki, Uma Devi’s Mallela Theeram…
According to Neelima small budget films have limited theatrical release and online screening turns out to be a better revenue model.
By releasing her movie online with a whopping 2K+ views within the first 3 days she becomes the bellwether for other Telugu film makers where online Day And Date release is still relatively a new route for monetizing the content. Alias Janaki was well received and acclaimed by overseas online audience than their counterparts in Andhra Pradesh.
Keeping with the trend another movie which is missed by overseas audience – Mallela Theeram is up for blocking on www.zingreel.com.
Most of the Indian film makers have a common belief that online screening leads to piracy and affects the theatrical revenues. But NRIs do respect copyrights and this is proved by Bangalore based company Zingreel when they released Alias Janaki online on the same day it released in theatres.
“For a family of four it costs $50 to watch a movie in theatre whereas it costed me just $4.99 on www.zingreel.com, with excellent streaming quality and that too with my family around is a terrific value for money “, says Praveen Kandikattu one of the online viewers.
With the changing mindsets and success stories, online movie release is going to be a very encouraging platform for the Indian film makers.
