Regional cinema received unprecedented appreciation and acceptance from the entire nation in the last two years, but at times, it takes a slow journey in gaining over North Indian audiences.
Movies like RRR and Baahubali became talk of the town, but they gradually came over to the minds and hearts of people. This phenomenon has made all of them ask one intriguing question: why do South Indian movies take so long to resonate among viewers in the North and can promotion truly be a reason every time?
Cultural and linguistic barriers are also crucial in this late acceptance. South Indian films are essentially made in regional languages like Tamil and Telugu, and therefore alien to Hindi-speaking audiences at least at the primary level.
Even with the most aggressive marketing, as in the case of Kanguva, which included all-important city-centric promotional events, Kanguva collected at the box office only meagre amounts in North India. The film can sometimes be distanced from the audience’s expectation of the North Indian cultural background, making it difficult to appreciate right away.
Moreover, the popularity of a movie also relies on audience expectation. Films like RRR and Baahubali are also examples of that nature, which have presented astonishing stories and production values, with hardly any leaves of scopes for other movies to compete with them.
However, promotion cannot always be considered the prime mover for success. Although marketing strategies are very critical for visibility, they cannot ensure audience engagement. Thus, KGF has also been one of the recent cases in point, which began slowly but went up the ranks after a few weeks owing to buzz after its release through positive words of mouth and social media.
The pattern here seems to be more about the cultural relevance and quality of the narrative overriding the promotional efforts. This problem was even pointed out by actress Samantha Ruth Prabhu stating that it takes time for the North audience to understand the different storytelling styles and cinematic approaches.
Although marketing is very important, there can be deeper cultural contacts and narrative engagement that forms the basis of appreciation of regional films by audiences in North India and it is certainly not for the reasons attached to promotional strategies.