udgets of movies starring mid-range heroes have been ballooning like anything in the Telugu film industry. With the rise of pan-India markets and high technical standards, producers are now betting big on content-driven cinema led by actors like Nikhil Siddhartha, Adivi Sesh, Sai Durgha Tej, and Naga Chaitanya.
Recently, Adivi Sesh revealed that the budget of Dacoit is Rs 75 Cr. His G2 (sequel to Goodachari) must have cost even higher. This kind of a figure was unthinkable just five years ago. Even if you concede the fact that budgets are exaggerated by about 20-30% in interviews, the monumental surge in overall budgets over the last few years is evident.
Last week, the producer of Sivakarthikeyan's Madharaasi claimed that the budget of the film was Rs 170 Cr. So, the situation is far worse in Tamil, it would seem from some selective facts.
The budget of Naga Chaitanya's Vrushakarma is reportedly going beyond Rs 120 Cr. Again, this is shocking, to say the least. Thandel was made on a budget of Rs 75 Cr. Is the budget of Vrushakarma being inflated for publicity purposes? If yes, by how much? Nobody can verify such info. Only those closely associated with production can tell you the truth with certainty.
The budgets of Sambarala Yeti Gattu and Swayambhu have gone beyond an imaginable threshold. Each of the two movies has been made on a budget of about Rs 125 Cr.
The non-event movies of Siddu Jonnalagadda cost anywhere from Rs 50-60 Cr. The day he does an event movie (like Kohinoor, which has been put on the backburner for now), it will cost more than Rs 125 Cr.
What is the X-Factor?
Are budgets touching the sky because OTT platforms are paying extraordinary figures, about which nobody has a clue? Theatrical revenues get tracked by trade analysts. What happens between streaming platforms and producers is not known to the public. Whenever foreign players are involved, be it in fields like education and healthcare or entertainment, rewards are huge for those involved. A doctor working in an Indian private hospital partly owned by American PE money, for example, earns a fat paycheck, the kind of figure Indian employers will never pay him no matter how indispensable he may be. Maybe, something similar is happening in the field of entertainment. However, if it's not OTT, what gives?
