Brahmotsavam definitely is the most anticipated movie of the season. It is a family movie releasing in Summer, which is prime time for movies in USA. Songs received rave reviews and trailer created good feel about the movie. Even though every thing was in place, the movie failed to cross Sardar Gabbar Singh (SGS) in US premieres Sardaar Gabbar Singh (SGS), which is a mass movie and had low expectations due to the theatrical trailer. Everyone expected that it will cross SGS by a good margin in premieres. There were expectations that the movie would gross 1M on premiers day ( We always opined that even 700k would be a very good number).

Here are some of the reasons why we think Brahmotsavam failed to beat SGS, even before the negative talk was widespread.

• Pre-release publicity: Even if it is a Mahesh Babu film, pre-release publicity is required. SGS distributor has to be appreciated for amount of publicity that they have done before release of the movie. However, for Brahmotsavam there were no publicity articles sent to web media. In fact, there was not a single press release about the movie. This is a free advertising left on the table. Most of the websites publish these articles free of cost for SGS

• Schedules: This is a perennial problem with Telugu movies. Schedules for were not clear till the eleventh hour. For SGS, schedules were confirmed few days before and advance ticketing was active well before the release. For Brahmotsavam, advance booking for some centers was not open even on Thursday afternoon. Updated schedules were not sent for most websites till Thursday. Since movies.telugu360.com works with Fandango, we didn’t have issue getting schedules, but most people were not clear on schedules.

• Theater selection: 
  • For example, in Chicago,  advanced bookings of tickets were opened on Monday for  Moviemax, a local theater chain,   the distributor tweeted not to buy tickets from there. And this issue was not resolved till Thursday. Most of Chicago people are used to go to Moviemax for premiers because of they are flexible about screening even when prints are late.
  • Also, Brahmotsavam distributor tweeted that Hero Ram is coming to Muvico, Chicago for 3PM show and some people bought tickets there. Ram quashed it saying he never had any plans. All these hints at improper planning, which otherwise would have  fetched couple of hundred thousand more.
  • Again in NJ it is a problem of plenty. One would question why 24 theaters in NJ/NY area were advertised ? and contrary to the announcement ,  it was exhibited in only 16 theaters. Again there was a confusion in which theaters it would be screened.

• Communication: It is a good sign that all the major distributors are on Twitter platform these days. We see they are actively resolving concerns from movie lovers. Good Sign!!  However, there is lot to be improved in communication aspect. We have received messages from a number of fans that the distributor doesn’t reply to emails or phone.

Premieres are a great opportunity to maximize the movie revenue before the reviews come out. Hope with proper planning, distributors will maximize revenue.

— Krishna (krishna@telugu360.com)