Bollywood faces cash crunch as movie success rate dips to 2 pc

Mumbai, Feb 23 (UNI) With the success rate of movies dwindling to an alarming two per cent, the Hindi film industry 'Bollywood' is facing a severe cash crunch these days.

The movie Moghuls, after squandering crores in the film industry, are now at their wit's end, desparately trying to come out of a difficult situation caused by the dwindling cash flow with the blockbusters falling flat at the box office week-after-week, industry sources said.

The high cost of production, soaring star remunerations and spending fortune on shootings abroad, have left producers, distributors and exhibitors pondering over new strategies to come out of the crunch.

Except for Aamir Khan starrer 'Rang de Basanti', none of the films released this year have managed a fair initial, trade sources said.

'Black', 'Bunty Aur Babli', 'No Entry' and 'Waqt' had clicked in a big way last year.

''The pricing of films has gone haywire with several corporates coming in and offering fancy prices to stars in the range of Rs 2-4 crore and this has also resulted in technicians jacking up their prices, having an cascading effect on the overall budget of films,'' a leading distributor said.

The massive losses faced by big distributors have made others extra-cautious about buying films, resulting in a number of films left unsold in natural territories, sources said.

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