Director Karthik Subbaraj has penned a long note on his social media handles expressing his disappointment over the state of Indian cinema, drawing examples of the issues faced by recent films - Vijay's Jana Nayagan, Sivakarthikeyan's Parasakthi and Suresh Kamatchi-backed Salliyargal. He said these are "tough times for cinema" and underlined the need for people in the film fraternity to come together, keeping aside the myriad of differences to "save art and cinema."

"Some thoughts, just as a lover of cinema. No theatres for a low-budget indie film, Salliyargal. Censor delay causing the postponement of a big-budget, big-star film like Vijay sir’s Jana Nayagan, slated to release tomorrow. Bookings are yet to open in many centres due to certificate issues for another big-budget film, Parasakthi, slated to release the day after tomorrow. Tough times for cinema!," he shared, listing down the issues that have been plaguing recent films.

For the uninitiated, Vijay's Jana Nayagan was expected to hit theatres on Friday, but uncertainty over its release started growing after it failed to procure a censorship certificate, even until Tuesday. Following this, producer Venkat K Narayana of KVN Productions moved to the Madras High Court. After hearing arguments from both the makers of the film and CBFC, Justice PT Asha announced that a judgment on the case will be passed on Friday, disappointing fans across the globe who were waiting to watch Vijay's final film outing in theatres before he steps into full-fledged politics.

On the other hand, Sivakarthikeyan's Parasakthi too faced similar censorship issues. The CBFC had reportedly asked for 23 edits, and the film was reviewed yesterday, January 7 with the certificate likely to be issued on Thursday.

Drawing similarities between these two films, the Jigarthanda filmmaker stated that the strict timeline rules for censors in India and overseas are "really hard to follow". He noted how it puts immense pressure on filmmakers and their creative space during the post-production process especially when it is a big-budget entertainer with a release date already finalised. "With current timeline rules for both Indian and overseas censors, the ideal time for a film to be fully completed is three months before release date which is highly impossible for many reasons. This has to be streamlined and should be made bit easy for filmmakers both from the board, producers and the stars," he explained, further warning that despite these hurdles, postponement of big-budget films, especially on festivals would "eventually kill the industry (sic)."

Suresh Kamatchi-backed Eelam Tamil film Salliyargal, which was slated to release for New Year, was pulled off from being released in theatres. The producer who backed the film under his V House Productions, announced the decision recently after he revealed that the team was given only 27 theatres. As a result of these issues, the film has now been directly released on streaming platform OTT plus.

Karthik Subbaraj voiced his concern on the obstacles indie films face when it comes to the number of screens allotted to them. "Theatres need to be more supportive of indie low-budget films, because big satellite and OTT players are not very keen on acquiring them. This leaves theatres as the only source of revenue for low-budget films. Not giving theatres to such films literally means killing cinema! (sic)," he said.

The director concluded the long note by urging people in the film fraternity to "keep aside the fan wars, political reasoning, personal agendas and hate Campaigns" to join hands to make an "optimistic" move to "save art and cinema".

While a new release date for Jana Nayagan is yet to be announced, Parasakthi is eyeing to stick to its previously-mentioned date of January 10.