While Payal Kapadia’s Cannes Grand Prix winning movie All We Imagine As Light has received two prestigious nominations at the 82nd Golden Globe Awards, if you can watch it today at a theatre near you is thanks to this guy. Rana Daggubati’s Spirit Media is the company behind the India distribution of the movie.

If you aren’t aware, the Baahubali actor is also an astute producer and entrepreneur. The grandson of filmmaker Dr D Ramanaidu and the son of producer D Suresh Babu, he was born into the business. Apart from being one of the main forces behind his family-owned production company, Suresh Productions, he also owns Spirit Media— founded in 2005 a VFX and production company [Rana started his career as a VFX coordinator] that has now evolved into a 360-degree content and brand ecosystem that focusses on original content development and distribution among other things. We sat down with the actor to talk about his company’s first pan-India release, which today happens to be a Golden Globe-nominated movie. 

What made you pick this movie for distribution?  

It’s been about five years that we have been distributing independent movies, rather alternative films. We never had festivals here, we would pick something from what we had watched and organise multiple screenings of it—we would gather the audience mostly through word-of-mouth publicity. But we never stepped outside of the Telugu industry, because first and foremost, it is just so expensive to land a film. Then P&A [promotion and advertising] takes up a chunk of the budget. Also, there's a certain standard norm that you need to follow. But when we saw All We Imagine as Light, we absolutely loved it—it is such a beautiful film. It touched upon topics that are personal and relatable. Also, a large part of the film is in Malayalam and it becomes a mainstream film in Malayalam as this narrative is accepted there. Malayalam movies have a good-sized release in Tamil Nadu, because they also have an independent sector. So, we understood that it can get a good visibility in South. We decided to pick the distribution for the whole country and see how it goes.  

In the previous interview, you had said that the first movie you had made didn't get a proper release despite earning a National Award. So, did that eventually impact your decision to back such films? 

 Absolutely. Right from the very beginning. I was 23 when I made A Belly Full of Dreams [also known as Bommalata, the 2004 Telugu-language children's film was coproduced by the actor]. The film won two National Awards [ Best Film in Telugu and Best Child Artist] but then nothing happened. Thank God for Doordarshan—they gave me Rs 50 lakhs for screening that film. Otherwise, there's no way of making money, there's no way of putting that film out to the audience. I found it really weird—here is a story that resonated with some people, the movie won awards because the jury liked it, it also went to a festival where it got good response, but nothing happened after that. I released it in a multiplex in Hyderabad but nobody came to watch the movie. And it was taken off that very weekend. 

It got me thinking how we can change the fate of such movie.  

Do you think the times now are more conducive for such films to find an audience? 

Indeed. It was early on in time where we didn't have the marketing tools that we have today. Back then, it was very difficult for me to compete on the main stage where you had big theatrical promos, big posters, and big stars. But now in the last four/five years, especially after the pandemic, stories have taken front seat. Today, the biggest film is not star driven, but story driven. Dubbed films with actors you've never seen before are not only getting box office numbers but also now there are franchise film sans the big stars. 

For example, movies like Hanu-Man and Stree/Stree 2 are so independent in nature, yet they are doing those big numbers. So, I feel like story has taken front seat now. Today, if I have a good story, it doesn't matter who the stars are, where they are from, where the filmmakers are from, if it can evoke a discussion, if it makes for an intriguing watch, it will work. Also, the festival circuits are growing, whether it's MAMI or IFFI, every year is seeing a sizeable increase in the number of attendees. So, I know the market is growing but we haven't really made the efforts to find the right audience and target them. We just do it on a very broad scale where all films go through the same mechanism. Now is the time that we learn these tweaking methods. If we are able to do it in the state, we can scale up the model and find a way to do it across India.  

So, what according to you are a few ways to release such film? 

When there is a star-backed commercial film releasing during the festive season, it is obvious that there would be good fan engagement. You can’t compete with it. Instead, you need to lean on a bigger film for support to reach a wider audience. The reason we chose to release All We Imagine as Light on November 20th was because by that time the big Diwali films are done. There will be enough people coming to the cinemas during the festival, and if they hear about this movie during that time, it might have a trickle-down effect.   

I would have been happier if there were more festivals like MAMI, where there is a place for filmmakers to talk about cinema—a film like this would have travelled to five or six festivals over the year enabling different pockets of audience see it, as well as different exhibitors and distributors see it. But we don't have that system in India yet. So, we did a small release in Kerala. We knew Mumbai was getting all this press because of Cannes. But in South India, it is very different—we don't track the Cannes that much. We for All We Imagine as Light did a local release in Kerala. And I remember we said, let's put the film out for a week so at least some people get to know about it. The first time we put a show, it filled up in two minutes. It established the fact that there is an audience for it. These are things we are learning as we are going about with it.

Do you think that going forward, there would be a process to release such movies?  

There will be. We're hoping All We Imagine sets some kind of precedent for us as a distributor and an exhibitor. We are carefully tracking this film while making sure we do whatever best we can to get the most number of people see it. It was as big as a mainstream film release, definitely in Kerala. And across India, we focused more on metros where hospitals and nurses are and the big city life is. Beyond that, we want the audience to tell us how much larger or smaller we should take this cinema.  

It is a good film to start with. 

And why did you opt for a theatrical release instead of an OTT one? 

Why not a theatrical is my question! I feel theatre is the most democratic thing that is available. You can make your film, it's censored at a certain level, and you just get to show it. Whoever wants to watch can go and check it out. I can reach the most number of people through a cinema hall. That is the way we are always built. Also, I think, watching this particular movie in a certain community makes it a very different viewing experience from watching it alone. It is deep, it is beautiful, it will be great on streaming as well. But I feel like it needs to take a theatrical journey before it goes to a streaming platform. Streaming platforms want to make certain kind of cinema. Sometime, if a movie does well in the theatres, they acquire those. 

Also, theatrical releases give you some sort of reality check—you know the kind of people that have made the effort to come out here. But in streaming, it's on a million handsets. That data is not what we understand.  

Usually, it is the hyperlocal stories that eventually find a global audience. But how much local is too much local and when does it get to into the zone where it is viewed through the lens of ‘exotic? 

Why does some art of cinema or alternative cinema that is not necessarily successful here becomes very successful globally? Sometimes our culture is our reality. You might or might not want to watch it on screen. But for somebody in a different part of the world, they're very curious to know what happens here. I have a lot of friends in South Bombay who don't watch Hindi films or even Hollywood movies. The are into European cinema. During the pandemic, many of those guys started watching Malayalam films regularly.  Because that was a part of the country they'd never visited. They never knew that that culture exists in India. I remember when Kantara released, people here were blown by it. It's something that we see in every single village. It's just that people haven't travelled there, and to them it was exotic. A movie is made by the filmmaker with a certain soul. But when it's watched, it does so many different things to so many people in the same cinema hall.  

But do you think a filmmaker should have a certain audience in mind while making a film? 

Filmmakers should honestly make a film from the heart. I think they should be honest, but for a distributor, it is important for me to know where my first audience is—the audience who is going to champion this film. I need to find them first, and then they will take me to the others. 

And the last question, what’s the progress on you dream project Hiranyakashyap?  

Oh, it's a big one, it's a beast. It's taking a much longer time than I thought it would. I think probably it will take another year to get this together. You are making mythology for the first time, and then you are making an Amar Chitra Katha film—it is a company that's lasted so many years. You have to be very very careful with it. You want to get everything right. 

Mythology is so vast and diverse… you don't want to go wrong. But the day I make it it will be awesome!