Joint press conference Rege + Singham returns
Marathi-Hindi Bhai Bhai – Teams of ‘Rege’ and ‘Singham Returns’ wish each other good luck !
Healthy competition between Hindi and Marathi films – No bitter fight to acquire cinema screens !
Piracy – A common enemy !!!
‘Rege’ and ‘Singham Returns’ come together for an event that’s a first in the glorious 100 year old history of Indian cinema. The producers of both the films which release on the same day – August 15th , addressed a joint press conference in a one if its kind gesture. Hindi films are often blamed for leaving a very small number of theatre screens for Marathi films. The producers of both these films have made it clear that this time they have divided the theatres amongst themselves in such a manner that both films will get screens in theatres that are most important for their respective film’s business.
The producer–director of ‘Rege’ – Abhijeet Panse, presenter Ravi Jadhav and Ashwini Darekar, Mahesh Majrekar who essays a major role in the film along with the producer-actor of ‘Singham Returns’ – Ajay devgn and producer-director Rohit Shetty were present at the event. Ravi Jadhav’s ‘Time Pass’ set a record early this year by crossing the 30 crore figure.
Ravi’s ‘Balak-Palak’ too was hugely successful last year. Rohit Shetty’s 2013 film ‘Chennai Express’ boasts of a 200 crores plus collection which has led to the clash of ‘Rege’ and ‘Singham Returns’ creating great anticipation amongst the audience as well as within the industry.
The Hindi film industry is forming its own 200 crore club while Marathi films too have been consistently flirting with collections of several crores. After the roaring success of films like ‘Balak-Palak’, ‘Duniyadari’, ‘Time Pass’, ‘Lai Bhari’, Marathi films attract a large number of audiences and are considered to be serious competition. Hindi films make business all around the world while Marathi films are limited to the state of Maharashtra, in fact to a select few cities in Maharashtra; as pointed out by trade experts the 30 – 40 crore collections of Marathi films is therefore as good as the 100 crore collections of Hindi films.
Given the background, the coming together of ‘Rege’ and ‘Singham Returns’ that release on the same day; is considered to be a very positive development. Hindi and Marathi films share a healthy competition. While piracy remains the biggest enemy of the business,
it’s best that instead of fighting each other these two industries have put up a united stand. The producer–director of ‘Rege’ – Abhijeet Panse, presenter Ravi Jadhav and Ashwini Darekar and the producer-actor of ‘Singham Returns’ – Ajay devgn and producer-director Rohit Shetty addressed the media jointly while affirming, “That’s the primary reason why we decided to mutually distribute the most important theatres within our two films.” The teams of both films also wished each other good luck and a smashing success.
About ‘Rege’
Written and directed by debutante Abhijit Panse, ‘Rege’ tells the story of a young medical student from affluent family trapped in the crossfire between Police and underworld. It is the fictionalized account of a notorious fake encounter which saw many encounter specialists from Mumbai Police going behind bars. Some of them have been convicted by a Mumbai court recently. Starring Mahesh Manjrekar, Santosh Juwekar, Pushkar Shrotri and debutante Aroh Welankar, it saw its world premiere in Mumbai International Film Festival (Mami) last year where it was among 8 Indian films selected in prestigious ‘New Faces in Indian Cinema’ segment. It was also selected for Pune International Film Festival (Piff), South Africa International Film Festival and Mauritius Film Festival where it received overwhelming response from the world audience. It won three awards in Zee Gaurav Awards in best director, best screenplay and best editing category. Cinematography has been done by Mahesh Limaye, while background score has been composed by ‘Black’ and ‘Saawariya’ fame Monty Sharma.
The promotional song ‘Dhichkyaon’ was launched recently which saw prominent stars like Deepika Padukone, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Riteish Deshmukh and Shekhar of Vishal-Shekhar fame tweeting the song and wishing the team for the success of the film. The song features many prominent names from Marathi industry such as Siddharth Jadhav, Sai Tamhankar, Sanjay Jadhav, Priya Bapat, Adinath Kothare and Urmila Kothare. The film is slated to release on 15th August.