17th June 2003

Considering that the movie was an Indian and a Telugu one at that - it hardly makes sense to find a basketball in the advertisements/ posters of the movie. As basketball is hardly a game that most people around here play; the use of a basketball would be a deterrent to the 'nativity factor' and hence, undermine the empathy that the audience would feel for the character. This in turn would work against the movie, and the all-important 'openings'. Thus, I felt, it would make more sense showing the hero carrying around a cricket bat.

However, rather surprisingly (for me) it did help in the marketing of the movie; and though the movie has bombed at the box-office, this poster helped in getting the 'openings'. (I even remember hearing one of my friends calling it 'cool' and 'chic', and I am quite sure that most of the people who saw the posters felt so too).

This is to say the least, remarkable - or is it?

Pavan Kalyan, who is the hero of the movie has got an 'image' among his fans and viewers as being 'cool'. His previous movie, Kushi, which was an unqualified hit, depicts him as the quintessential cool dude, winning him many admirers, (not to say anything about imitators). So, the picture of Pavan with a basketball should not be, and is not surprising for many of the viewers (not including myself). However, what is surprising is why do we consider basketball as 'cool'? - If as I think (and rightly, I presume) that is the reason it is used on the posters. There is, I feel another reason for the use of the basketball in the posters; but more on it later.

We consider basketball as 'cool' because it is shown in American serials like Small Wonder and most American households supposedly have a basketball court in the backyard of their houses? Come on, this cannot be true. Unfortunately, it is! We consider the West, and mainly the Americans, as having a culture that is worth imitating, if not imbibing. I agree that they have a seemingly more tolerant culture - 'seemingly' as I do not believe that they have. Otherwise, how can one explain the treatment meted out to Negroes? - to call Afro-Americans by the name that they had been called for more than a century, (and still are, where education and all that it stands for, like homogenizing the public, has not made inroads into the general consciousness and hence, paved a way into treating them as American citizens, albeit 'Afro'). This looking up to the Western culture, probably, also explains the exodus of Indians (students mainly) to these countries. I know that their answer to this is that there are better educational facilities available in the West, but that does not explain the reason for their staying on and taking up jobs there resulting in the 'brain drain' of their motherland, does it?

The other reason - to which I alluded before - for the presence of the basketball on the posters, is that the American Indians (I do not refer to the 'Red Indians', but to the 'migrated' Indians) might identify with the movie and therefore flock to the theatres. This is a mirage -- considering that the movie is not even playing in any theatres (even here in A.P.) for a reasonable number of days for anyone to even seriously deliberate upon watching it.

Conversely, if it is the marketing of the movie in the States that resulted in the presence of a basketball in the posters, then there is also the reason of using a basketball in the posters to market basketball as a game to the Indian audience. Further, bearing in mind that basketball is considered as 'cool' and Pavan Kalyan is 'cool', the sponsor of the movie Pepsi is also 'cool' or 'chic' (as 'cool' has got other connotations) by virtue of the company it is keeping, and hence, the use of the basketball goes (and probably did go) a long way in promoting the interests of Pepsi.

Weird are the ways of marketers, indeed. Some food - or drink (Pepsi) - for thought this.

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