How long are you willing to wait to see Dhurandhar: The Revenge or Project Hail Mary, both released in March, on your favourite streaming platform? Eight weeks or four? That’s the question that filmmakers and theatre owners are grappling with.
Stakeholders across India’s film business are even discussing whether a standard gap between a film’s release and its streaming debut would work for movies across languages.
Universal Pictures set a precedent by mandating an eight-week theatrical window globally before its films can be streamed. Several theatre owners in south India are demanding that films follow the eight-week window for OTT premieres instead of four weeks now.
Studio executives and cinema owners said the bigger issue is how box office performance eventually aids the sale of ancillary rights. Many of them are of the view that the window should depend on the scale and theatrical potential of a movie because there is no point holding back a film that does not draw in viewers.
“From the exhibition side, a longer and more predictable theatrical window is something the entire ecosystem benefits from,” said Ashish Misra, head of commercialization at Cinepolis India, which operates 449 screens in over 40 locations in the country. “When a studio like Universal extends its window globally, it reinforces what exhibitors have always maintained: theatrical revenue has room to grow when you give a film adequate time in cinemas.”
However, the challenge with a purely movie-specific approach is that it creates uncertainty for the audience, Misra said. If a viewer does not know whether a film will be in theatres for four weeks or eight weeks, it may change their urgency to buy a ticket.
“A baseline standard, even if individual films negotiate upward from there, gives audiences and exhibitors a degree of predictability that helps planning on both sides,” he added.
Revenue models
Experts said the conversations need to involve producers, distributors, exhibitors and streaming platforms. Each has a different revenue model and a different relationship with time. What makes this complex is that it is not just a commercial decision—it shapes audience behaviour.
“India is a very diverse market with multiple language industries, so a single standard window may be difficult. We may see broader alignment in principle, but not necessarily a one-size-fits-all model,” said Abishek S Vyas, founder and CEO of AVS, an arts and entertainment company based in Dubai and Mumbai operating across film production, art licensing, audio media and content-driven intellectual property.
Senior executives said streaming platforms themselves benefit from a theatrical release, a point reinforced by the current trend where platforms refuse to pay high upfront fees and instead link movie acquisitions to their box office performance. A senior executive at a streaming platform said there is a move towards a more dynamic, data-led model rather than fixed timelines.
“Bigger films with strong theatrical pull will naturally benefit from longer windows, while others may follow a more flexible approach,” he pointed out.
“We cannot really predict a film’s box office performance before its release. So, if a film performs weakly in the initial few days and fails to pick up, exhibitors will naturally replace it with another film,” producer Anand Pandit said. “In that case, enforcing an eight-week window means such films, which are no longer being screened in theatres, are simply held back. By the time they reach OTT after eight weeks, the audience may have already moved on or even forgotten about them.”
Flexible timelines for individual films can help maximize revenue. Big-ticket films with strong theatrical pull can benefit from longer runs, while smaller or underperforming films can move to OTT sooner and recover costs more efficiently, Pandit pointed out.
Active theatrical window
Such conversations are active, particularly in the south, where the producer ecosystem is more aligned and decisive.
Bhuvanesh Mendiratta, managing director of multiplex chain Miraj Entertainment Ltd, said there is a clear understanding of the value of the theatrical window, and a strong intent to protect and extend it where possible.
“That said, a uniform, one-size-fits-all policy across India may be difficult to implement. Each industry—Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam—operates with its own dynamics, audience behaviour and scale. Budgets and the overall money at stake also vary significantly across languages, which directly influences recovery models and windowing decisions,” he said.
So, while the direction may be similar, the approach is likely to remain flexible rather than standardized, he added.