The Secret Behind The Success of Sairat

The Secret Behind The Success of Sairat Posted By Nitya

I am a Tamil woman living in Pune, Maharashtra. The recent release of the south superstar Rajni’s Kabali had me in a fit of happiness and excitement. As, I sat there in my office gushing about the movie, all my co-workers, Marathi, were all eager to express that he was from “theirs, from Maharashtra”. Each and every single person pointed that he is Marathi. I replied, yes, but he is ours now. He became a superstar in my city, Chennai. But they would not relent because he was originally, “Marathi”.

I sat there wondering about the person from, yes Maharashtra, who got to be so famous that he is known worldwide, today. I started wondering about regional film actors and this got me thinking of Marathi films. Now, even though I rarely watch films, with the exception of Rajnikanth’s films, I have heard about the Marathi movie, Sairat. Now, if you live in Maharashtra, I am sure you have heard about his movie and have even seen it. A movie that has been accepted by non-Marathi speaking audiences and English audiences alike.

Superstars such as Shah Rukh Khan and Salman Khan, might be able to pull audiences into the theater, simply because it is their film, but even then their movies have been known to flop. While audiences love your regular masala films with lots of drama and sentiments, the people have evolved, just as cinemas. When people go to the movies they want to see a heart wrenching and beautifully told story. It is movies, with beautiful stories such as, Sairat, that have people flocking to see it, whether you speak the language or not. So, it isn’t a question of why people aren’t seeing Marathi films, but rather how can the film industry create such great stories, that it breaks through the language barrier and gains its success and popularity amongst non-speakers as well. At the end of the day, you don’t want just the regional language people watching the film, but people from all over India and beyond to want to see the movie that everybody is talking about. So, forget about making masala movies and start making movies that capture human emotions and sentiments realistically and it won’t matter if the movie is Marathi, Hindi, or Telugu. The people will come and they will see it and love it, just like Sairat.