B’wood not bowled out by IPL fever

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The IPL fever is raging, but filmmakers don’t seem to be at the suffering end. With big budget films like Bombay Talkies, Shootout at Wadala and Go Goa Gone releasing soon, filmmakers are not shying away from releasing films in IPL season.
In spite of cricket matches being the flavour of the evenings, cinema halls haven’t registered a fall in footfall, says Gautam Dutta, Chief Operating Officer of PVR Cinemas.
“Even after IPL started there has been no decrease in footfall in cinemas. Ek Thi Daayan had about 80-90 per cent footfall during its first week. The opening collection of Iron Man 3 has also been good,” he says.
In previous years the IPL season would hardly see any big budget films releasing and cinemas had to screen IPL matches on 700 mm, says Ashish Saxena, COO, Big Cinemas. “To avoid a clash, filmmakers barely released any films during the first IPL season. Only a few small budget films would hit the screen. But things have changed now and producers do not see cricket as a threat to their business,” says Saxena.
Film distributor Sanjay Chattar gives the example of Hollywood. “In US they have big league matches going on throughout the year. But that never affects the film business there.”
It seems Bollywood refuses to be bowled out by IPL this season.