Amazon Prime Video has done the impossible; the OTT giant has managed to land two huge films to stream on their streaming platform – the Malayalam horror mystery ‘The Priest’ starring Mammootty and the Kannada action drama ‘Yuvarathnaa’ starring Puneeth Rajkumar. What makes it even more impressive is that Amazon Prime got the streaming rights for the Malayalam movie after the movie ran in theaters for six weeks, while the Telugu film’s streaming rights were bought after the film dropped in theaters, just a week prior.
Theater owners are understandably in shock by the decision, especially by ‘Yuvarathnaa’s’ quick turn to OTT after the film only ran for one week in theaters. KV Chandrashekar, president of Karnataka Exhibitors Association, expressed his shock and dismay by ‘Yuvarathnaa’s’ production house to the media. Especially after a harrowing year (thanks to the pandemic), theaters are struggling to stay open after the mis-treatment from both the government and film producers association.
‘Yuvarathnaa’s’ quick turn to OTT might seem like a surprise but after careful evaluation – it was a long time coming (although, only a week in the theaters is still ridiculous). The movie was supposed to release on the eve of Dusshera, back in 7th October 2021. However, due to post-production delays, the movie’s release date shifted to December 2019, which then shifted to January 2020, then 3rd April 2020 and then finally to 8th May 2020. By then the pandemic struck the globe and the movie ended up collecting dust for over a year. A movie such as this can easily lose its relevance if it is not released by a set period of time.
Eventually the pandemic died down and the movie got a release date of the 1st April 2021. But two days before ‘Yuvarathnaa’ was going to release, the Karnataka State Government reduced the 100% occupancy allowance back down to 50% from the 1st of April, due to the sudden surge in Covid-19 cases. At the producers request, the state government managed to push that date to the 7th, but the damage was done. The producers then made a deal with the OTT platform and now here we are.
The film managed to rake in Rupees 60 crore and it would have managed to reach a 100 crore easily, if it was allowed to run without any competition from Amazon Prime Video. We still have yet to hear statements from Kerala Theater Owners regarding Mammootty’s ‘The Priest’ as they want films which star superstars to run for a minimum of 60 days before it goes to an OTT platform. Maybe, due to the surging coronavirus cases, they decided to let the film go to the streaming platform – but we are still waiting for an official statement from the Kerala theater associations. One thing is clear – Amazon Prime Video is stepping up their game when it comes to acquiring the streaming rights of regional films featuring regional megastars.
‘The Priest’ will release on Amazon Prime Video on 14th April 2021. ‘Yuvarathnaa’ is currently streaming on the previously mentioned OTT platform.
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