CASE STUDY #1

Globalization of Production & Markets of Indian

Motion Pictures A Case of Krrish
BUS 420: SUMMER 2015

SUMMARY
This case talks about the overall globalization of Indian Cinema with
special regards to the case of super hit Bollywood movie Krrish. Over
the years, Bollywood has witnessed tremendous growth and changes
due to technological developments and immense demand on the
international scene. Most Bollywood movies today are shot in several
international locations and the team consists of various international
workers. As regards to the case of movie Krrish, the movie was shot
primarily in Singapore, with special assistance from the Singapore
Tourism Board. The team consisted of several foreign workers
including famous action director Tony Ching Sui from Hong Kong, a
special FX team of Craig Mumma and Marc Kolbe from Los Angeles and
several others from different countries. Translators were hired and
thousands of dollars were spent alone for facilitating easy translation.
Millions of dollars were invested in the movie and it was well received
by the global audience and critics, generating more revenues than the
Hollywood superhit movie Superman Returns, which was released at
the same time. The production house of the movie did a global release
so as to minimize the effects of piracy.

QUESTIONS
1. How has Indian film industry evolved through ages?

The Indian Film industry has witnessed tremendous growth and

changes since when its first released film in 1913. The Indian Film
Industry can be divided into 4 major generations. They are:

1)
2)
3)
4)

1920
1950
1970
1990

1950
1960
1980
2000

(The Early days of Indian Cinema)

(A Golden Age of Indian Cinema)
(The Angry young man awakens)
(Bollywood gains global popularity)

Liberalization and Globalization helped the Indian film industry to

enter

into

the global

multinational

market

corporations

and

and

attract

foreign

the

sponsorship

investors.

This

of
was

supplemented by technological inventions and the transformation

from black and white to colored cinema.

However, the Indian Cinema gained much of international attention

when Amitabh Bachchan defeated Sir Laurence Oliver (An English
cinema legend) and won the BBC Super Star of the millennium in
1999.

Currently, Indian film industry has a growth rate of 12.6% as compared

to Hollywood that has a 5.6% growth rate, thus out beating Hollywood
and becoming the largest producer of films in the world. This is also

evident from the fact that Krrish made more revenue than Hollywood
movie Superman Returns (a part of the famous Superman series). It is
projected to generate an overall revenue of $3 billion by 2016.

2. How did the project created taking into consideration

Indian diaspora abroad?

The directors and producers of Krrish recognized the growing demand

for Indian movies by the Indian diaspora in 156 countries like Canada,
USA, UK and other countries around the world. This was also evident
from the success of DDLJ not only in India, but by large by the Indian
Diaspora in these 156 countries, receiving international accreditation.

Also, the team of Krrish recognized the need to launch an Indian

superhero that would give competition to Hollywood superheroes like
Superman, Batman, Spiderman, etc. This need was recognized by the
growing demand as posed by the NRIs, and predicted that it would be
a success to launch an Indian superhero.

3. How did Mr. Rakesh Roshan used two countries

competitiveness for the project (India & Singapore)?

For making Krrish a super hit, Roshan created a team consisting of

professionals from both India and Singapore, thus combining Indian &
Singaporean expertise. His teams Indian counterparts consisted of
leading Indian Director Sham Kaushal and his team of 15 assistants
and fighters and Singaporeans counterparts consisted of different
stuntmen and artists. Moreover, Roshan was approached by the
Singaporean Tourism Board with a proposal to shoot in their country
with complete government approval. The board went out of their way
to help with the movie shoot by redirecting traffic and making
locations available.

4. What are the globalization factors that influenced the

production of Krrish in Singapore? How many countries
representatives helped in creation of mega success film
Krrish?

The major globalization factors that influenced the production of Krrish

in Singapore were geographic, political and behavioral influences.

In terms of geographic factors, Singapore posed a perfect location to

carry on the movie shoot due to the presence of all the pre-requisites
to shoot the movie in accordance to its story line, like tall buildings,
beautiful skyscrapers, heavy traffic roads and flyovers.

In terms of political factors, the Singapore Tourism Board themselves

approached the team with a proposal to shoot the movie in their
country. The government of Singapore was very supportive of the
shoot and made all arrangements to facilitate the shooting.

As regards to the behavioral factors, the people of Singapore as well

were very supportive of the movie being shot in their country and did
not engage in any counter productive behavior to disrupt the process.
This is also evident from the fact that premiere shows and press
conferences were organized in Singapore and were well received by
the people there.

Overall, representatives from mainly 4 countries were involved in the

creation of this movie India, Hong Kong, Singapore and USA. The
production house, actors and other supporting crew were from India,
the special action director Tony Sui was from Hong Kong, the special
FX were done from a team from USA and the Singapore Tourism Board
helped with facilitating the shoot in their country.