If you ask me, Friday is the best day of the week. It’s the last working day of the week (for most of us), everyone is happier than usual, you can finally give shape to those long-pending plans, and add to that, a new movie release. What’s not to love?
Talking about movie releases, have you ever wondered why a majority of movies in Bollywood release on a Friday? Are they just tapping in on the weekend, or is there more to it? We tried to dig deeper and found some interesting theories on Quora which made perfect sense.
Read on and see if they surprised you as well?
Most of us know that the concept of releasing Bollywood movies on Fridays comes from Hollywood’s practice of Friday releases with Gone With The Wind being released on 15th December, 1939.
However, the trend of releasing movies on a Friday didn’t start in India until the late 1950s. Neel Kamal released on 24th March, 1947, which was a Monday. Mughal-E-Azam was among the first movies to be released on 5th August, 1960, a Friday. So we ended up adopting the British/American legacy after all, in the late 1950s.
Since there was no color television at that time, movies continued to be strategically released on Friday to make up for half-days on Fridays owing to informal norms in small scale industries in Mumbai.
Also, Friday is considered as the day of goddess Lakshmi in India. So, releasing movies on Friday came from the belief that producers would be blessed with good wealth.
Producers organise muharat shots of a movie, breaking the nariyal on a stone on shubh Shukravaars as Friday is considered auspicious in India by most religions.
There is also a commercial aspect to it. The screening fee that producers have to pay to multiplex owners is higher for days other than Friday.
Now you know that Friday is not just another random day but a well thought-out day to release a film! Go on, show off this brand new information to your friends.
