PremiumGhost has less promotion and Leo none at all, yet latter is on a box office rampage in Karnataka. Why?
Ghost and Leo will clash at the box office when they both release on October 19. As of now, Leo appears to have a clear advantage in Karnataka
Ghost has more single-screens outside of Bengaluru, but in the city, Leo wins hands down
Last Updated: 03.21 PM, Oct 17, 2023
In the last several days, fans of Thalapathy vijay in Bengaluru were less than pleased with the Karnataka distributor, Swagath Enterprises, for not releasing the first list of theatres or opening advance booking for the film. By then, the first list of Shivarajkumar’s Ghost had come out and it looked impressive, in terms of single-screens outside of Bengaluru. Then, the Leo list came and on Sunday, bookings also opened and that’s when Kannada film aficionados and trade trackers realized that the Vijay film had nearly done a clean sweep of all the major single-screens in Bengaluru, which is its primary market in Karnataka, while Ghost barely got any.
This was an eventuality that Jayanna Films, which is distributing Ghost in the state was expecting. Social media has been abuzz with discussions about this disproportionate allocation of screens in Bengaluru, with trade trackers pointing out that Leo had got more shows in Bengaluru than even in Chennai, and far more than the Kannada release of the week, Ghost.
As soon as bookings of Leo opened for October 19, shows began filling up fast and furiously, with the film reported to have done over Rs 10 crore and counting business, what with massively hiked ticket rates. In comparison, the bookings for Ghost, which opened a day later, have been relatively sluggish. Netizens have been saying that this could be attributed to a lack of buzz surrounding the Shivarajkumar starrer because of less promotions. The team did not conduct any major event in Karnataka.
A proposed pre-release event in Ballari was cancelled and Bengaluru was not on the promotional map. Instead, they went to Mumbai and Kochi, with Hyderabad slated to happen next week. Industry trackers believe that this lack of offline events is hurting the prospects of Ghost, but several netizens have retorted that this is not the sole cause. Leo, which had very limited promotion led by its director Lokesh Kanagaraj, had no events at all in Karnataka, and yet bookings have been rock solid in the state. This, they claim is because Tamilians take far greater pride in their films than Kannadigas do. They also reckon that the flurry of activity for Leo bookings is not only down to the city’s Tamilian populace, but includes Kannadigas too.
The fact that Leo has early morning shows, whereas Ghost doesn’t is also not in favour of the Shivarajkumar-led action heist thriller, say netizens. Distributor Jayanna had been categoric that there will not be early morning shows for Ghost, with the 12 AM show the only anomaly. Leo, on the other hand opens with 4 am shows in the state.