India makes far too many films  — a 1000 plus films a year. Many are small budget films. They can succeed if they have strong content. Neither do they have good content, nor the wherewithal to bear the marketing and promotional costs. Imagine if they compete with big budget films. Will they find the audience ? A spectator investing into local transport, parking charges at the mall where the multiplex is housed, the entry charges, the food material charges would like to have his/her money’s value back from the movie. A film that is not likely to give wholesome entertainment will not qualify for his preference.Indian films have to back good scripts that can drive the audiences in. Most of the films lack a good script. While a film is being produced, there should be strict focus on cost cutting and cost elimination by identifying unnecessary items of expenditure. For instance, there are payments to the entourage of the stat, say to the driver, hair stylist, dress designer, helpers, assistants, make up artists etc. Such costs add up to Rs 2 crore and once the movie is released these can be recovered if the movie makes an additional business of Rs 5 crore. Instead, once the star is contracted on a certain amount of fee, it is expected that all these expenses will be borne by the star, and would not come from the kitty of the producer. One major factor that has pushed up the cost of production is the amount of fees paid to the star. If these run into Rs 50 to Rs 70 crore, you can imagine the total cost of production. The entry of the corporates have pushed up the star fees. Instead, the fees should be axed to the realistic levels, say they can be linked to the first day box office collections of that star.Further remuneration can be participative, say a particular percentage of box office collection. Production schedules should be well-planned so that dates do not go waste.Some years back, satellite rights used to subsidise the high costs by bringing a very hansome amount to the producer but the rights have now come to realistic low levels.