Multi-starrer: An evergreen money-spinner

'Kalank', starring actors like Madhuri Dixit Nene, Alia Bhatt, Varun Dhawan and Sanjay Dutt, minted Rs 21.60 crore on its first day, making it the highest opener of 2019 so far. With more all-star cast movies lined up this year, a trade expert says most filmmakers tend to adopt the hit formula as it's one of the ways to pull audiences from their palms and laptops into the theatres.

"Multi-starrers have always drawn in the audiences. It is not a recent trend though. I remember films like 'Shaan' and 'Naseeb' were also multi-starrers. But now, audiences have a lot of options for entertainment. They don't just have the option of going to cinema but can also watch films on phones. So, to lure audiences to the big screen, multi-starrer films come quite handy," film and trade expert Girish Johar told IANS.

With the presence of stars, the scale of a film rises. "Also, each star has his own fan following so that increases audience's base and the penetration of the film gets wider," he said, adding that the content has to be good too.

The box office performance, he felt, also depends on how they are made and when they are released. For instance, two single hero films this year, 'Kesari' and 'Gully Boy', raked in Rs 21.06 crore and Rs 19.40 crore on the opening day, while multi-starrer 'Total Dhamaal' brought in Rs 16.50 crore.

"If there are too many films releasing on the same day, it might affect the box office figures. But multi-starrers do have an edge," said Johar. Some of the upcoming all-star cast films include Salman Khan, Katrina Kaif and Tabu's 'Bharat'; 'Mission Mangal' (Akshay Kumar, Vidya Balan, Sonakshi Sinha, Taapsee Pannu and Nithya Menen); 'Good News' (Akshay, Kareena Kapoor Khan, Diljit Dosanjh); Anurag Basu's untitled film with Rajkummar Rao, Abhishek Bachchan, Fatima Sana Shaikh; 'Housefull 4' (Akshay, Riteish Deshmukh, Rana Daggubati) and Anees Bazmee's 'Pagalpanti', starring John Abraham, Anil Kapoor and Arshad Warsi.

Bazmee said he doesn't rope in actors just for an additional face on his films' posters. "If there are seven to 10 actors, then there will be seven to 10 characters in the film. They should feel like it's their own film," the filmmaker told IANS.

"Also, making a multi-starrer film is very challenging. It's difficult to manage their dates," he added. Actor Kunal Kemmu has been a part of filmmaker Rohit Shetty's 'Golmaal' franchise for a while now.

He has also been part of 'Go Goa Gone' and 'Kalank'. Asked what he liked about being a part of multi-starrer movies, Kemmu told IANS: "The most important reason is that it's not on your shoulders."

But that's not the only reason. "It's the story that always attracts me. A film like 'Golmaal' only works because of all of us. It is as much Ajay's (Devgn) film as it is mine or Arshad's (Warsi) or Tusshar's (Kapoor). These are the stories of the gang," Kunal said. Johar concluded by saying: "Multi-starrer films were a trend in the past, are in the present and will be in the future too."