Sankranthi 2024: Can Telugu States Accommodate These Six?

The Telugu film industry is gearing up for a massive release festival very soon as 2024 is approaching fast, opening gates for the super-profitable Sankranthi season in the second week of January. With some recent announcements, it has come out that ‘six’ films are surely targeting the season without any miss and that is the biggest problem right now, if trade circles are to be believed.

First of all, the major biggie for Sankranthi 2024 is Mahesh Babu’s Guntur Kaaram which locked January 12th. Young hero Teja Sajja’s HanuMan also locked the same date and reiterated that they will be coming on it, without any change in plans. Then we have Vijay Devarakonda’s Family Star set for 13th January, while Venkatesh’s Saindhav also locked the same date. Now we have Raviteja’s Eagle confirmed for the same date other day. Then comes Nagarjuna’s Na Saami Ranga which is targeting a couple of days later on the 14th or 15th. With these six films in the fray, the first question that comes to mind is, will Tollywood’s available theatres in Telugu states easily accommodate all these movies?

The first thing is that, even if all these films get good talk, surely they will eat into each other’s business. In a way, this is more like killing the theatrical business and the one that gets average talk will get crushed, while the one that gets flop talk if in case will be wiped out in a day or two from the single screens. As each of these films are supported by a big distributor with a big network of theatres, everyone is expressing confidence right now about the release date.

But one should think from the audience’s perspective as well, as no one will be interested in watching six films in a short span, but only they will pick the Top 3 that get good talk. Even if all of them get blockbuster talk, the average middle-class audience will have money enough for three films at the max per person, which is nearly ₹1000 rupees. So, producers and distributors should also think about this aspect before making the release date calls.