Entertainment
’Baahubali’ is tribute to Indian epic Mahabharat: Filmmaker
Chennai: Filmmaker S.S. Rajamouli, whose highly anticipated magnum opus “Baahubali” – which he calls his tribute to Indian epic Mahabharat – releases in cinemas on Friday, says the creative success of his film is more important than its box office prospects.
“I’m usually not motivated by money. When my films succeed creatively, that’s my biggest achievement. The creative satisfaction I get from my films matters to me the most than box office numbers,” Rajamouli told.
Although he admits film economics is important, he says that’s not what drives him to make films.
“Baahubali”, which is touted as one of India’s most expensive films at Rs.250 crore (nearly $40 million), is Rajamouli’s “tribute to Indian epic Mahabharat.”
“One of the biggest inspirations behind ‘Baahubali’ is ‘Mahabharat’. The epic war drama between the Pandavas and Kauravas has always fascinated me,” he said, adding that the Amar Chitra Katha comics too helped him envision the world of “Baahubali”.
The film, originally made in Telugu and Tamil, will also release in Hindi and Malayalam in dubbed versions.
Asked why he chose to release the film in multiple languages, he said: “Given the budget of the film, it’s impossible to recover the cost involved if we release in one language. Right from the start, the plan was to make it as a Tamil-Telugu bilingual. Hence, we cast actors who are popular in both the industries.
“Following the success of ‘Eega’ (‘Makkhi’ in Hindi), we had planned to release ‘Baahubali’ in Hindi as well.”
When the team was looking for someone to release the film in the northern belt, filmmaker Karan Johar came on board.
The film is all set to release in a record number of 4,000 screens worldwide.
It took the team nearly three years to complete the first part of the film. With another 120 days of shoot left on the second part, it’s expected to hit the screens next year.
Rajamouli says it wasn’t easy to stay motivated throughout.
“We struggled towards the end, especially to complete the last 20 percent of the film, as most actors by then had almost given up having shot for over a year. But I always believe the team draws its motivation from the director, so I had to push myself and others without losing my cool,” he said.
Despite the long wait, the buzz around “Baahubali” was always alive. It’s perhaps the best marketed south Indian film ever.
“A lot of planning went into all this. Over the last one year, we’ve been very active on social media platforms. We needed to create the buzz, make audiences – irrespective of the region – curious about our film. And the only way to do it was through marketing,” he said.
Megastar Amitabh Bachchan too has heaped praise on Rajamouli’s creation and even wished to be part of it.
Asked if he plans to rope in Big B in the second part of the movie, he said: “I’d love to work with all the stars, provided I have a suitable script for them. I can’t approach them just because I want to work with them. For ‘Baahubali’, I had decided long back that Prabhas was my hero. I let my script choose my actor and not vice versa.
“It was nice of Bachchan sir to say lovely things about our film.”
The film is about the story of two warring brothers for an ancient kingdom. It features Prabhas, Rana Daggubati, Anushka Shetty and Tamannah Bhatia in the lead roles.
International online casino Casino Days has published a report sharing their internal data on what types and brands of devices are used to play on the platform by users from the South Asian region.
Such aggregate data analyses allow the operator to optimise their website for the brands and models of devices people are actually using.
The insights gained through the research also help Casino Days tailor their services based on the better understanding of their clients and their needs.
Desktops and Tablets Lose the Battle vs Mobile
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The authors of the study point out that historically, playing online casino was exclusively done on computers, and attribute thе major shift to mobile that has unfolded over time to the wide spread of cheaper smartphones and mobile data plans in South Asia.
“Some of the reasons behind this massive difference in device type are affordability, technical advantages, as well as cheaper and more obtainable internet plans for mobiles than those for computers,” the researchers comment.
Xiaomi and Vivo Outperform Samsung, Apple Way Down in Rankings
Chinese brands Xiaomi and Vivo were used by 21.9% and 20.79% of Casino Days players from South Asia respectively, and together with the positioned in third place with a 18.1% share South Korean brand Samsung dominate the market among real money gamers in the region.
Cupertino, California-based Apple is way down in seventh with a user share of just 2.29%, overshadowed by Chinese brands Realme (11.43%), OPPO (11.23%), and OnePlus (4.07%).
Huawei is at the very bottom of the chart with a tiny share just below the single percent mark, trailing behind mobile devices by Motorola, Google, and Infinix.
The data on actual phone usage provided by Casino Days, even though limited to the gaming parts of the population of South Asia, paints a different picture from global statistics on smartphone shipments by vendors.
Apple and Samsung have been sharing the worldwide lead for over a decade, while current regional leader Xiaomi secured their third position globally just a couple of years ago.
Striking Android Dominance among South Asian Real Money Gaming Communities
The shifted market share patterns of the world’s top smartphone brands in South Asia observed by the Casino Days research paper reveal a striking dominance of Android devices at the expense of iOS-powered phones.
On the global level, Android enjoys a comfortable lead with a sizable 68.79% share which grows to nearly 79% when we look at the whole continent of Asia. The data on South Asian real money gaming communities suggests that Android’s dominance grows even higher and is north of the 90% mark.
Among the major factors behind these figures, the authors of the study point to the relative affordability of and greater availability of Android devices in the region, especially when manufactured locally in countries like India and Vietnam.
“And, with influencers and tech reviews putting emphasis on Android devices, the choice of mobile phone brand and OS becomes easy; Android has a much wider range of products and caters to the Asian online casino market in ways that Apple can’t due to technical limitations,” the researchers add.
The far better integration achieved by Google Pay compared to its counterpart Apple Pay has also played a crucial role in shaping the existing smartphone market trends.
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