‘Too early to assess the exact effects of the US President Donald Trump’s decision to impose a 100 per cent tariff on foreign-made films, ’ say the producers and distributors, adding that if this applies to Indian films releasing in the USA, then the ticket rates will surely go up. The tariff hike announcement on movies was made by Trump earlier this week.
Asked about Trump's latest announcement, Shibasish Sarkar, president of the Producers Guild of India, said, "We should wait till he comes with a circular on the same. It seems that he is focused on the US films which are going outside of the US for production, and he wants to raise the tariff when they come to the home country for exhibition. The objective is to bring local employment, investment. In such a scenario, a non-US film releasing in the US, I don’t foresee any major impact.”
However, if the tariff applies to all films, both American and foreign, being released in the US market, then Indian films could feel the impact.
"In that case, the producer will pass on the ticket prices to the consumer, then the footfalls will come down. For Indian films it is not of much significance because a substantial amount of business comes from domestic ticket sales. Among overseas markets, the US is big, but it constitutes only 6 to 7 per cent of overall revenue for Hindi films. For Tamil and Telugu films, the US is a significant market. If there’s a tariff of 100 per cent, then there will be an impact of 5 to 6 per cent for South films, and for Hindi films it will be 3 to 4 per cent at the revenue level,” he added.
Leading distributor Rajesh Thadani also had an opinion on this tariff hike.
"If the 100 per cent tariff is applicable to Indian films and companies, then it will definitely have some impact on us. The US is a significant market for Indian films, especially South language movies like ‘Baahubali’, ‘KGF’, and others. If the tariff is on Indian films being shown there, then the ticket rates might go up and fewer people will go to theatres. It is yet to be known whether the streaming platforms like Netflix and others come under this tariff or not,” he said.
Exhibitor-distributor Akshay Rathi said North America is a significant market for Indian films, particularly for Telugu films and cited, "The movie fraternity can continue to release their films in North America. It is in the interest of the theatres over there to make sure they price the ticket sensibly, where the 100 per cent tariff works out to be reasonable so that enough people turn up at cinemas. I’m sure they will find a solution to make sure that the consumption of movies is not hampered because of the tariff. However, it is important to wait for the fine print of the policy to be out because then that will lead to more clarity.”
Ramesh Taurani of Tips Films said, "It’s too early to comment on this, he keeps saying something new daily. We should wait and watch for things to get sorted.”
Producer Himanshu Mehra, known for films such as "Detective Sherdil", "Jogi" and "Bloody Daddy" as well as OTT series "Tandav", also raised a question on how the proposed tariffs would impact movies.
"In my opinion, there’s no physical import; it’s an IP import. So how will the tariff apply — on the value of the film or on ticket sales — is something one needs to understand. Not many industries have a huge market there. To be honest, if this cost is passed on to the end user, the ticket buyer and the diaspora will feel the impact as they are the big consumers. We will have more clarity once we know how this is going to play out," Mehra added.
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