First-Mover Advantage

BY CHOOSING TO STREAM HIS FILM ON A DIGITAL PLATFORM, SHOOJIT SIRCAR IS SHAPING BOLLYWOOD’S ‘NEW NORMAL’

- Suhani Singh

This is not how Shoojit Sircar imagined it. His film, Gulabo Sitabo, was supposed to release in theatres on April 17. Now, however, it will directly stream to homes via Amazon Prime Video from June 12. In an ideal world, he would have been promoting his film in Mumbai, but he is presently with his family in Kolkata, a city dealing with the double blow of Covid and the Amphan cyclone. Instead of complaining, though, Sircar is adapting. “I have to move on,” he says. “I didn’t want to hold on to the film. I decided to experiment with the digital medium.”

Sircar’s decision sent shockwaves through the movie theatre industry, which saw it as a bellwether of what filmmakers are likely to do with cinemas now shut. For Sircar, though, the attraction was Amazon giving him “a big release” in 200 countries. His film would have 15 dubbed versions and subtitles in several languages such as Indonesian, Hebrew and Polish. “We are going directly to the audience,” he says. “It’s not going to take away from what the film is all about.”

Gulabo Sitabo is a good fit for the digital platform, too. Written by Juhi Chaturvedi, who has also written other Sircar-directed hits such as Vicky Donor and