Star dominance and Movie acceptance by consumers in Malayalam film Industry

Star Dominance is one of the hot crises in today‘s Malayalam movie world. Its existence makes many issues in the Kerala Film Industry sector. Thousands of people with creative roles are employed in the film industry in Kerala alone, and most of them work for low salaries. However, an extremely small group is able to command much higher salaries – superstars may receive crores of rupees as salaries for a movie. In some instances, stars are even demanding a percentage of the gross profits also. Such salaries lead to the increase in overall production budgets. Several researchers have studied the effect of star power. Most studies in Hollywood uses star power and box office performance as the variables (e.g. Litman 1983; Litman & Kohl 1989; Litman & Ahn 1998; Wallace et al 1993). Focusing solely on the role of stars, Albert (1998) shows that stars are the most factors for success of movies which, he explains their influence in Hollywood. Most of these studies are based on Hollywood. But today‘s issues in Malayalam movie world demand this type of study. This study aimed to identify the star dominance in Malayalam movies world and its acceptance by consumers. Its relevance in Malayalam movies industry is very important in this present situation. The study employs both primary and secondary data. Primary data is proposed to be collected through structured questionnaire using Likert scale (Likert, 1932). Both descriptive and inferential statistics shall be applied to support the study.