Bhagat Singh bombs assembly…just a game

Aamir Khan’s Lagaan proved that you could take home a bit of the film with you when you left the cinema hall. The Lagaan bug of marketi...

Aamir Khan’s Lagaan proved that you could take home a bit of the film with you when you left the cinema hall. The Lagaan bug of marketing film merchandise has bitten other big-budget films as well: from the also-ran Hrithik Roshan starrer Naa Tum Jaano Na Hum to the forthcoming Anil Kapoor release Badhaai Ho Badhaai and the Deols’ bio-pic on Bhagat Singh, producers are jumping at the idea with a passion that threatens to make shopping malls as much a benchmark of a film’s performance as a movie hall.

The products are not quite a Dracula Lunch Box or the election material that launched a fictitious Nixon campaign for Oliver Stone’s film, but mainly kid’s stuff — comic books, stuffed toys, board games, activity kits. Yet, the idea is catching on: Badhaai Ho Badhaai’s producers have planned a blitzkrieg of a launch at the swanky Crossroads in Mumbai this month-end. A range of products manufactured by Egmont Imaginations India and priced between Rs 45 and Rs 295 will be marketed across 9,000 outlets nationwide.

To those who stifle a yawn in anticipation of Lagaan-induced deja vu, Egmont’s marketing head Vikas Phadnis says, ‘‘We are not going to be repetitive.’’ The paraphernalia ranges from activity kits comprising colouring books, masks and key chains to a Ludo-like board game with cardboard cutouts of the film’s characters and a book-and-audiotape set.

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The patriotic purveyors of Bhagat Singh are not far behind. The Deols’ home production company, Vijayeta Films, has also tied up with Egmont to produce a similar range of theme merchandise based on 23rd March 1931, Shaheed. In case, you are wondering how anyone would tell which of the half-a-dozen Bhagat Singh-inspired films the products are meant to promote, the buzz is the Deols have worked on the script to focus on incidents that the others have glossed over.

After Aamir’s comic book hero turn, it’s Bobby Deol’s exploits that will be available in an illustrated book. The Lagaan experiment has entered its fourth reprint and shows no signs of slowing down. ‘‘We have already crossed one lakh copies, including exporting about 20,000 copies to the Middle East, US and UK,’’ says Phadnis. Multiply that by Rs 50 per copy and you get a sales figure that could rival the film’s takings atleast in a small territory like Cooch Behar.

Indeed, the potential is ‘‘unbelievable,’’ as Pantaloon Fashion House Entertainment’s MD Kishore Biyani puts it. His home venture Na Tum Jaano Na Hum did not exactly have Hrithik fans scaling theatre walls. But it hasn’t discouraged sales of toys and apparel patterned on the film, which lined the shelves at Pantaloon stores.

Biyani, of course, has the enviable distribution muscle provided by his own retail chain which enables him to keep the costs down and position products innovatively. So though NTJNH didn’t do well, the apparel range inspired by it apparently did ‘‘phenomenal business’’ in smaller cities like Nagpur. The same principle allows Biyani to stock a Harry Potter collection or Monsters sets too.

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Apart from clothes, toys and accessories, the Next Big Thing is gaming. Early players like Lumen Phon are trying to blend the appeal of Bollywood with the thrill of a computer game. The company is designing one that shows Bhagat Singh dodging the police and guards to throw a bomb in the Delhi legislative assembly. Lumen Phon director Santanu Bhattacharjee says, ‘‘This is the future. We are trying to convince people of its potential.’’ He’s hoping to put out the game in time to coincide with the movie’s release.