Mollywood’s most expensive feature film, ‘Marakkar: Lion of The Arabian Sea‘, is heading to Amazon Prime Video for a direct-to-OTT release. This announcement is still creating shockwaves in Kerala with theatre associations being forced to look at their current policies, so as not to let another big-budget blockbuster slip through their fingers. With a budget of Rs. 100 crore, ‘Marakkar’ will also be the most expensive Malayalam movie to release directly for streaming easily beating out Fahadh Faasil’s ‘Malik’. Amazon Prime has paid the most amount of money for the acquisition of the streaming rights of a Malayalam film than any other OTT platform – thereby beating Netflix’s record.
Netflix has paid close to Rs. 40 crores for the streaming rights of Minnal Murali. Amazon Prime Video, however, has paid Antony Perumbavoor an eye-watering sum of Rs. 90 crores for the streaming rights of ‘Marakkar: Lion of The Arabian Sea’. This means that the Malayalam historical epic is not only the most expensive Malayalam movie of all time, but it is also the most expensive Malayalam film to buy the streaming rights for, having beaten the second-most-expensive film by more than double its amount. ‘Marakkar’ is already breaking OTT records before the film even has a release date yet.
With the filmmakers behind the Malayalam war epic having waited for almost 20 months for a release, we expect ‘Marakkar’ to premiere before the year ends. Since the film has been acquired, Twitterati and Netizens have been flooding the official social media pages of Mohanlal, Amazon Prime Video India and Antony Perumbavoor, asking them for the film’s release date. Knowing Amazon Prime Video, we should get the release date in the form of a trailer on YouTube with the famous Amazon Prime watermark in the background. For now, we have to wait and see.
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