Are Marathi filmmakers finding it difficult to release their movies in Karnataka, especially in Bengaluru, because of the State’s border dispute with Maharashtra?
Chaitanya Tamhane, director of award-winning Court , and Shiladiyta Bora, its distributor, said exhibitors were apprehensive of releasing Marathi films in Bengaluru. Exhibitors in the city, however, claimed the delay in release had nothing to do with any political issue.
Best feature film
Court , a multilingual court drama, which has won the Best Feature Film Award and has been screened in various international film festivals, could not be released in Bengaluru on April 17 during its nationwide release.
Mr. Tamhane, whose debut venture won national and international acclaim, is upset that his film could not be released here. According to him, while Court was released in all the major cities of the country, the audience of Bengaluru were denied an opportunity to watch it as distributors and exhibitors were apprehensive of problems from “some language organisations.”
Mr. Bora said, “Though the film was released across the country, distributors and exhibitors feared screening the film here attributing the decision to border and language issue.”
Time Pass 2
He expressed doubts over Time Pass 2 , a Marathi film by Ravi Jadhav, being released here.
However, Hemanth Kumar of PVR Cinemas refuted the allegations of both Mr. Tamhane and Mr. Bora. He attributed “lack of slot” on April 17 as the reason for not releasing the film. “The film could not be released purely because of slot problem, not for either language or border issue. None of the Kannada organisations came in the way of releasing the film,” he claimed.
