When the South Indian film industry shows solidarity, even chaos feels weak

South Indian cinema has been a show-stealer, not only grabbing major screen-share but also ruling OTTs during the two pandemic years- 2020 and 2021. And you will witness this getting even stronger in 2022 and much bigger than Bollywood in every possible way. Now, the Hindi audience seems to be comfortable more with regional content than it was before. 

Behaviour-wise, the Southern film industry is way beyond what you can imagine. They definitely believe in the 'live and let live' philosophy. For instance, very recently, SS Rajamouli and other big filmmakers and actors decided to hold a meeting- only to be on the same page on the release dates of their respective films. Interestingly, the next day, there was a tsunami of release dates. 

From RRR, Sarkaru Vaari Paata to Acharya and Radhe Shyam, among many others, the makers announced the release dates of their much-aspired projects at the same time and on the same day! 

Clearly, together, we can do so much and there is no stability without solidarity, and this entirely reflects what regional cinema is all about. 

And we're not stopping here. In 2020, Tollywood bigshots like Baahubali director SS Rajamouli, producers D Suresh Babu, C Kalyan, Dil Raju, including actors Chiranjeevi and Akkineni Nagarjuna had a meeting with Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy to resume film shooting in the State. The Telugu Film Industry (TFI) has always maintained and remained united during such cases. Eventually, the CM assured them full cooperation for the betterment of the industry. 

Point to note: The initiative was only taken so that the livelihood of daily wage workers doesn't get affected. 

Kollywood’s show of unity: Remember when several stars—right from Kamal Haasan to Rajinikanth— held a silent protest meeting in Valluvar Kottam, urging the Centre to constitute the Cauvery Management Board? The who's who of the Tamil film industry participated in the protest. The Kaveri water dispute has been a major controversial issue between Tamil Nadu and Karnataka over the years. However, a delay in establishing a Cauvery Management Board to share equal rivers led to protests in TN. 

One negative story and the entire industry unites for one's fight! Bigwigs like Chiranjeevi, Mahesh Babu, Rana Daggubati had united to express solidarity with Vijay Deverakonda in his battle against fake news. 

After Vijay showed disappointment with a gossip website for allegedly spreading fake news about him, the actor decided to run a trend on social media called, '#KillFakeNews.' "@TheDeverakonda We stand by you. Pl don't let anything deter ur spirit to do good. Humbly request Journo friends not to peddle individual views as news #KillFakeNews," Chiranjeevi wrote on Twitter.

"I want to protect our beautiful industry Of Telugu cinema, I want to protect my fans and I want to protect my kids from a world where this is considered normal. I call upon the industry to act upon these fake websites that live off us and disrespect and lie about us collectively. #KillFakeNews #KillGossipWebsites," Mahesh Babu also came out in support of Vijay Deverakonda. 

The Producers’ Councils representing the four South Indian film industries – Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, and Malayalam, a few years ago, had protested against theatres against the Virtual Print Fee (VPF) levied by Digital Service Providers (DSP) on regional films. Many didn't bother what the issue was, technically, but the point is how the entire industry gathered, putting their movies worth crores at stake by protesting against cinema halls. 

(What VPF is- It is basically commission given to DSPs, who deliver content directly to theatres via satellite. With this, the process of exhibiting films underwent a huge transition as theatres turned digital.) 

In 2017, celebrities from the Malayalam film industry, politicians, and commoners gathered at Durbar Hall Ground in Kochi. And no, it wasn't to promote a film but to show solidarity to the actress who was abducted while she was travelling from Thrissur to Kochi in her car. 

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they have vowed to support no matter what...

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