The Indian Film Market: Economic Effects of Television on Film Production and Exhibition

In: Journal of creative communications, Band 6, Heft 1-2, S. 67-101

Abstract

Media economics investigations of the international flow of media such as films reveal the importance of domestic consumer spending on films. Television penetration is seen as a threat to this. In this article, the effect of television penetration on the annual number of theatrical admissions, the annual number of films produced and the number of screens was examined using time series data from the introduction of television until the year 2005. This was examined in the context of the five major film producing countries: US, UK, France, Germany and Japan. Statistically, India fits the international pattern of a significant negative effect of television penetration on aggregate and per capita theatrical film admissions. Further, television penetration had a negative but non-significant effect on the number of films produced and on the number of screens. Descriptive data show that India's persistent aggregate admissions appear to be more an artifact of the population size rather than a higher frequency in visits to the theatres. Since 74 per cent of Indian film industry revenues come from theatrical admissions, these results may interest policy makers in view of the fact that India is the only country in the world other than the US where domestic films have approximately 93 per cent market share.