Article No.23 CRITICAL STUDY OF FINANCIAL PRACTICES AND SYSTEMS IN ORGANIZED FEATURE FILM INDUSTRY SECTORS IN INDIA Amit Padmakar Oak Faculty, SASMIRA Abstract: The Union Government of India gave industry status to the movie business in the year 1999. As a result there has been a greater involvement of the Corporates in producing and financing the movies but the Film Industry and Hindi Film Industry has yet to acquire the character of professionalism on a large scale. Film Industry is that which is involved in producing and distributing movies. The Film Industry involves motion pictures studios, manufacturers of technical equipment and software, distribution and personnel on a global scale. The Financial Management aspects for Hindi Feature Films are the subject matter of the study. The biggest hurdle today is getting finance for the Feature Film Production in India. From writing the screen play to the final release of the movie, there is value added at every step of movie making. The proposed study has the following objectives: 1. To understand the practices of Film Financing for Feature Films 2. To develop a financial plan with criteria of ROI and Debt Equity as a system to verify the financial feasibility of a feature film. (Budget of the film assumed to be Rs 2 to 4 crores). 3. To receive the opinion and judgment of various stake holders on a model. Keywords: Financing, Business Model. Introduction The emergence of Cinema as the most popular medium of entertainment is one of the significant events in the history of mankind. No medium has acquired such a universal acceptability and attraction, as the cinema within a short period of its invention. It is appealing to all, the intellectual and the layman, the young and the old, the rich and the poor. Millions of people see movies regularly in all parts of the world. It is the wide popularity which has made cinema a great commercial endeavor. Within a few years of the invention of scientific mechanism of cinema it has grown into a regular industry. This study shall focus on the philosophical path of the research. Cinema is such a medium of entertainment that it is very attractive and also very entertaining. It is full of imagination and the viewer sees himself into the body of a hero or a heroine or any such character with which its profile matches. This is the true source of entertainment. Similarly people have a different kind of curiosity about the actors; they like to read the love stories, gossips of characters which are very popular. Even old films and songs make AIMA Journal of Management & Research, November 2012, Volume 6, Issue 4/4, ISSN 0974-497 Copy right © 2012 AJMR-AIMA the persons nostalgic. So if we look at cinema absolutely from marketing point of view it is a product which is mysterious. However this product needs very high level of intelligence in terms of creativity which can catch the pulse of the public. There are many such examples of creativity. Now if we see Cinema from the view point of finance, in India we find that the finance available for making a film is believed to be invested from the source of unaccounted money. From the year 2000, Cinema has been given the status of industry. Now almost a decade has passed. Once we accept that it has a status of industry then logically it should be at par with in respect of the process of sourcing the finance as shall be applicable in case of any industry which is service one. The reason is the intangibility characteristic of the product. For example if an entrepreneur approaches a bank with a proposal to finance a hotel with accommodation facility, in this case the occupancy of the rooms cannot be guaranteed. In case of cinema, similarly the box office collection for the show has no assurance. But over the last ten years the cinema producer has not only one source of collection that is box office, but now he can receive revenue from sale of various rights like internet and mobile, also he can sale such rights either at pre production or post production. In case of Cinema the level of risk is higher than any other manufacture of the product. But this market also follows higher the risk higher the gain. Here the gain is of the nature which we can call super profits, super premium and unprecedented windfalls. Thus the dream of this academic effort is to draw a path for such young talent for making a film which will remunerate him as an entrepreneur (Producer), over and above as an artist/actor/director and also earns up money to plough back as capital, for the next film. Similarly with de risking, he will be insulated from agency problems and vicious circle track. This shall be dealt adequately from the view point of academics in forth coming chapters. The researcher does not look at this research only from the theorization point of view but also look at it enriching application value and catalyzing such youth in future. Film Finance Evolution and Sources Film finance is an aspect of film production that occurs before pre-production , and is concerned with determining the potential value of a proposed film. In the United States, the value is typically based on a forecast of sales over a 10 to 15 year period, beginning with theatricalrelease , and including DVD sales, and release to cable broadcast television networks both domestic and international and in-flight airline licensing. Film finance is a subset of project finance, meaning the film project's generated cash flows are used to repay investors, and generally not from external sources. This however has been met with new ways to protect principal, and insure against loss of investor's assets. AIMA Journal of Management & Research, November 2012, Volume 6, Issue 4/4, ISSN 0974-497 Copy right © 2012 AJMR-AIMA Bollywood spends significantly more time in the production stage compared to Hollywood. Some possible reasons are, • Cost overruns due to inadequate planning in the development stage itself and • Lack of smooth funding during various stages of production (especially in the case of mid and low budget films) • In the post-production stage, too, Bollywood tends to spend relatively lesser time compared to its US counterparts. Some probable causes are, • Unavailability of funding (due to the film being over-budget at the production stage itself) • Lack of importance given to post production • Haste in releasing the film in order to recover the money. Present Financial Scenario of Film Financing The seeds of corporatization have been sown and early forms of vertical integration between content producers, distributors, exhibitors, broadcasters and music companies can be observed in the industry. The stakeholders, especially the new generation of, • Producers, • Directors and • Performers, are now much more receptive to international best practices to redefine the way of doing business. Better discipline has resulted in a slow turnaround in the industry, which recovered from an unsuccessful 2002 to record better profitability in the last two years. Literature Review It is needless to stress upon the significance of literature review not only in case of writing a thesis but even for a small or elaborative research. The literature review is made with two dimensions, 1. Critical reading for the purpose of developing the conceptual clarity of the context. 2. To examine the relevance to the context of the study by following the process of elimination. The researcher has not only conducted literature review in India but he was fortunate and effortful to visit Universal Studio, California State USA where he spent almost two weeks to review the literature. The researcher came across very valuable material as AIMA Journal of Management & Research, November 2012, Volume 6, Issue 4/4, ISSN 0974-497 Copy right © 2012 AJMR-AIMA regards overall film making and in particular the issues related to the topic of the research. Since the researcher was then a convener for Brihan Maharashtra Mandal’s bi-annual Convention visited California for three months. Specifically a fortnight was card out for this period for the purpose of visiting the studio and library of California State University. This resulted into broadening of perspective about the issues of the topic. Voluminous information is available as regards to film making. However while reviewing the literature in the light of the context of the study that is financial plan, critical parameters, financial feasibility, debt and equity proportion are the major elements of consideration. Most of the literature talks about art, story, creativity, film making process and such other things. The select material with concentration on financial dimensions is reviewed thoroughly. Data Analysis and Findings Following are the various sources of literature review. 1. Film Dictionary 2. Books 3. Journals & Publications 4. Websites 5. Reports 6. Magazines 7. Government Notifications 8. Working Committee Reports 9. Thesis 10. Newspapers 11. Encyclopedia Going Global On the global scene, Hollywood is the undisputed leader in the entertainment industry. However, many other regional film industries are competing at the second tier. Italian, French, British, Japanese, and Hong Kong-based industries are among them. In the recent years, the bug of globalization has hit Bollywood. With the expansion of its operations in the overseas markets, even though to a limited extent, Bollywood has attracted a great deal of international interest. One of Bollywood's most recent and prestigious achievements was the film Lagaan's nomination for the Oscar in the Best Foreign Film category in 2002. Even though India witnessed a slight disappointment when it did not win the award, the nomination helped Bollywood gain international presence and proved that Indian films have the potential to make it big overseas.