KGF, Kantara-fame Hombale Films to invest ₹3,000 crore in Indian cinema

“We intend to invest ₹3,000 crore for the next five years in the entertainment industry in India. We believe the entertainment industry will grow more and more.”

“It will be a mixed bag of stories. Every year there will be five-six films including one event movie. As of now we have plans of making movies in all south languages,” Kiragandur told PTI in an interview.

The goal, the producer said, is to reach out to a wider audience through culturally rooted stories.

Hombale Films is backing Sri Murali’s ‘Bagheera’. (hombalefilms/Twitter)

“We want to make something that is liked by the global audience, but we want it to be rooted in our culture and tradition. We want to leave something behind for the younger generation. We also want to contribute towards the Indian economy,” he added.

In order to expand their viewership, the Bangalore-based production banner has decided to join hands with writers and filmmakers from the Hindi film industry.

Upcoming projects

Without divulging details, Hombale Films partner Chaluve Gowda said they have roped in two leading writers from Bollywood to pen movies for the banner.

“We are working with a couple of writers in Hindi… Once the story is ready then we will look for directors and then actors. We first concentrate on writers because they are the ones who create the story,” he said.

Keerthy Suresh’s upcoming movie ‘Raghu Thata’ is being produced by Hombale Films. (hombalefilms/Twitter)

The company’s upcoming movie slate includes pan-India Prabhas-starrer Salaar, set to be released on September 28. The action-adventure film is directed by Prashanth Neel. They are also backing multilingual film Dhoomam, Kannada action movie Bagheera and Tamil film Raghuthata with Keerti Suresh.

The banner is launching Yuva Rajkumar, grandson of superstar Rajkumar, in one of their upcoming titles. The film will be directed by Santhosh Anandram and it will be released by the end of 2023.

“For the next year we have four to five movies and for another two years we will have 12 to 14 movies,” Kiragandur added.

In 2024, there is a social thriller Tyson in pipeline with Prithviraj Sukumaran, Richard Anthony with Rakshit Shetty and a movie with director Sudha Kongara of Soorarai Pottru fame.

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Pan-India success

Hombale Films, which was founded in 2013, tasted pan-India success in 2018 with period action KGF: Chapter 1 starring Yash. The first film produced by the company was Puneeth Rajkumar-led Ninnindale.

Rishab Shetty’ ‘Kantara’, produced by Hombale Films, has been declared one of the top 10 popular movies by IMDb. (hombalefilms/Twitter)

This year the banner had a golden run at the global box office with “KGF: Chapter 2” and “Kantara” emerging as big successes. Both the movies have reportedly earned over Rs 2,000 crore worldwide.

“We were able to beat some records that we created, like ‘Kantara’ became the highest grossing film in Karnataka. For KGF 2 the footfalls were six crore and for Kantara it was about two-and-half to three crore,” Kiragandur said.

Also in the pipeline is the third part of KGF, which Gowda said will become their focus after director Neel completes Salaar.

“There are plans to make KGF 3. Currently, Prashant is busy with Salaar and once he has completed the movie then he will work on the script (for KGF 3). He has a storyline… It can happen next year or after that,” the producer said.

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