PVR eyes regional language films as a big money spinner

HYDERABAD: India’s largest multiplex chain PVR is betting big on regional language cinemas and expects higher revenues from this segment in the coming years mainly driven by increasing local content and dubbing of Hollywood movies into regional languages, said Gautam Dutta, chief executive of PVR.
While Bollywood holds the lion’s share at 61% revenue, it is followed by regional and Hollywood movies with 21% and 18% shares, respectively.

“Regional movies are growing at a rapid pace mainly due to the growth of multiplex screens, and South feeds on local language content. While the average occupancies in India hover around 54-57%, Telugu movies in Hyderabad generate higher occupancy of nearly 58% and this segment will really take off in the next 3-5 years with filmmakers increasingly coming out with local content at a very economical cost.,” said Dutta.

He was speaking on the sidelines of launch of two PVR properties in Hyderabad on Thursday with 13 screens including South India’s first PVR ICON, an upper market offering along with children’s screen Playhouse.

With this, the total screens in Telangana adds up to 36 and 155 screens in South India.

Additionally, the company also plans to bring in a lot of innovations in the food and beverage (F&B) space. “We are exploring a lot of options. We are working on the local palette to add it to our menu. Along with that, we are also experimenting with a restaurant-based concept called Simply Sushi, which we are piloting with our Gold class offerings,” said Gautam Dutta.

PVR currently has 625 screens across India, which it plans to take up to 1,000 screens by 2021.