Media Trends in 2016

We all love stories!

The last few years has seen a major shift in storytelling. The trends and themes that have dominated the silver screen have been big blockbusters with heroes and large budgets that require larger returns to break even. The 100 crore film was made popular. If you weren’t a 100 crore Actor/ Director no one paid attention to you. The stories didn’t matter and there was no logic in the screenplay!

And then suddenly we had films like Dum Laga Ke Haisha, Hate Story 2, Talvar, Mary Kom and even Tanu Weds Manu and the equation changed.

Storytelling was back! Scripts were back. And great quality cinema was given a push.

In 2016 we will see many more women oriented stories where the heroines aren’t just there for item numbers or the heroes’ love interest. Bollywood will be ruled by dramas, biopics and thrillers. While the big blockbusters may remain, the trend will be towards smaller budget films with good quality content. The success of a film will lie in the timing. The mood of the generation will also help or hinder the film’s box office. The producers however will still bank on the larger pictures and new directors might not have so much support.

With ads we saw a shift from ads reaching out to the middle class, to a younger generation that had the power to spend. The stories became about family and transformation. Ads that tugged at the heart strings. Ads that had bigger budgets to show who we were and what we should be.

In 2016 we will see more ads with stories. The trend of 2015 will continue but it will be more celeb oriented unfortunately, since we are a Bollywood driven society. Sometimes the celeb over powers the story. People only remember how pretty or good looking the celeb was who is paid crores for the ad and the quality of the ad suffers since no one remembers the brand!

A great trend that may happen in 2016 will be new digital series and ads that are integrated for stories on the internet. There will be entertainment for the internet generation. A generation that’s on the move. As we saw with the YRF series TVF Pitchers there will be many more shows that will have brands integrated as a part of their story telling but not take away from the fun. This trend will help brands since ads are now fast forwarded on recorded TV!

Directors will move from making films to producing digital series and actors will move from TV ads to featuring in films. The combination and amalgamation will be an exciting new trend for 2016 where we will get to see more of our favourite stars and directors and watch interesting stories.

A fantastic new trend of 2016 will be books being converted for the digital series and films. Books are stories that have already got the approval of a market and have connected with a section of society. Filmmakers would be wise to develop screenplays from already existing books. 

Also printed in the Pioneer Paper December 12, 2015 : http://www.dailypioneer.com/vivacity/a-new-beginning.html