Cancel Culture Hits Shabaash Mithu Hard

Viacom 18, the  producers  of Srijit  Mukherjee’s  Shabaash  Mithu didn’t seem to have  much faith in their product. The  almost-nil  marketing and  promotion, has  taken its toll on  the  brave  if not entirely brilliant  biopic on cricketer Mithali Raj , which  has sunk  without a  trace in the  day of release  .

The  all-India collections  on Day 1  were a meager 45 lakh rupees, which is a  disgrace for the cricketer  Mithali Raj, Taapsee Pannu who plays Mithali and director Srijit Mukherjee  who has a formidable reputation  in  Bengal , and producers Viacom 18 who  were at one time the leading producers  in Bollywood  but have apparently now fallen on hard times.

A day after the release  on Saturday, shows were reported  being cancelled  from different parts  of  the country. At the  strategically located Ambience Mall in Gurgaon the  12.55 pm show  of Shabaash Mithun had to be cancelled due to meager attendance.

I spoke to a personnel from the theatre  minutes after the shocking cancellation.This  source  confirmed  the shocking development. “Normally on a weekend afternoon we  get 35-60 percent attendance  for any  new film. This is  the  first time in living memory when we had to cancel a show  due to almost zero attendance. We  had sold one ticket which was refunded. Luckily the  young lady left without creating any fuss.”

Bihar’s prominent exhibitor Suman Sinha says the collections of Shabaash Mithu are abysmal. “It is lower  than this week’s other release Hit: The First Case. We have one show of Shabaash Mithu and  it is struggling for survival.”

To what do we attribute the woefully  meager collections of Shabaash Mithu? Well, for one it looked like another sports film starring Taapsee Pannu. She has  done similar films before  nothing new in  it.

Says Suman Sinha, “Rajkummar Rao, Taapsee Pannu, Vidyut Jammwal…. These are talented actors  but  they are OTT stars. Their films should  go straight to OTT.”

A more important reason for the film’s failure was the apathy of the producers Viacom 18.

“They had no interest  in promoting  or releasing the film. We  had to do what we had  to on our own,” a source connected to the film told me.