Theatrical movie exhibition in India is going determinedly digital -- and arguably leading the world in the number prints of a new feature film simultaneously released the all-digital way, evenas they cannily leverage social media tools.. Consider these numbers:
The Ranveer Singh - Anushka Sharma starrer 'Ladies vs Ricky Bahl' runs in  529 UFO digital theatres this week. The Manoj Bajpayee starrer 'Lanka' releases in 240 UFO digital theatres. 'The Dirty Picture' is running successfully in 712 UFO theatres in its second week.'Desi Boyz' in its third week is screening in 100 UFO digital theatres, while 'Rockstar' continues to screen in 13 UFO digital theatres in its fifth week.
It's digital in the non-Hindi movie world as well:This week's bigrelease is the Telugu film 'Panjaa', which opened to audiences in 219 UFO digital theatres. The Tamil film 'Osthe' released in 134 UFO digital theatres on December 8th, 2011. The Kannada flick 'Vishnu Vardhana' released in 63 UFO digital theatres on the same date. The Tamil film 'Poraali' screens in 51 UFO digital theatres in its second week while 'Sri Rama Rajyam', in its fourth week, screens in 40 UFO digital theatres. .
UFO Moviez,(www.ufomoviez.com ) is the world's largest satellite delivered digital cinema networand has revolutionized the way films are distributed and exhibited throughout India. UFO has a base of 2,776 digital screens (145 3D Screens), spread in 1300 cities in 28 states of India. Out of these, around 350 screens are in multiplexes (which constitutes over 30% of the multiplex population in the country) and the balance are single screen theatres. UFO has so far released more than 3,900 films in 29 languages and has conducted over 8.8 million shows till date.
Harnessing Social Media New wave Hindi cinema makers have not stopped with digital screening.In addition to multiple promos on YouTube, Ladies vs Ricky Behl has harnessed the combo pulling power of social media and e-commerce,having tied up with India's first and largest social commerce portal, MyDala www.mydala.com  by offeringfor a fewe days, a 50% discount on movie tickets across major cities in India, at the site.
Winners of mydala contests also received free movie tickets as well as an exclusive opportunity to meet Ranveer Singh & Anushka Sharma at the music launch event of Ladies vs Ricky Bahl at YRF Studios in Mumbai.
In yet another industry first, mydala has also booked an entire movie hall in Delhi and Mumbai to host a special screening exclusively for ladies on the first day, in sync with the movie’s title. It has given away free movie vouchers to ladies who emerged as winners of its various contests to watch the movie.
Says Anisha Singh, founder and CEO of mydala.com, “When we associated with Yash Raj Films to promote their movie Ladies vs Ricky Bahl, we knew that we were about to create history, and did not want to leave any stone unturned. Nobody had tried social commerce as a medium to promote a big-ticket movie. Where on one hand it instilled excitement in our team to be part of such a unique campaign, at the same time, it was a huge challenge for us to simultaneously mobilize woman power as well as to leverage our multimedia campaign to effectively promote the movie. We are thrilled to have received such a huge response from mydala fans.”
Launched in November 2009, mydala is India’s first and largest group buying portal that offers unbeatable discounted deals on the best stuff to do, eat, see, and buy in major cities across India. While many of the deals are city-specific, mydala also features several pan-India deals which can be bought in any city across the country.
Click here to see Anushka’s “Ladies vs Ricky Bahl” video clip on mydala: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=U5zm8JQGa10