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STAR India would be launching its second English movie channel, STAR Movies Action (SMAC) on June 2. It would offer the best of action movie titles from Hollywood.
On June 2, the channel will go live on all the major direct-to-home and digital cable platforms. It would also be the first channel to be in the action genre in the English movie segment.
“The most consumable and popular genre in the movies is action. If you take the top 100 English movies, 83 are action-based. We, being the leader in the space, thought why not have another specific product for our audiences and fill the existing gap in the category,” Kevin Vaz, business head-English channels, STAR Jalsha & Jalsha Movies at STAR India, told Business Standard.
The new channel would cater to a large target group between the age of 15 – 34 years, in a one million plus population. In the launch month itself, the channel would premiere three of the biggest action movie releases of 2012 — Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, Jackie Chan-starrer Chinese Zodiac and the sequel of the Taken franchise, Taken 2.
Some other titles in the library include Rambo (Parts 1, 2 and 3), Cliff Hanger, Commando, Terminator 3, Total Recall, Accidental Spy, The Medallion, Little Big Soldier, The Chronicles of Riddick, The Fast and the Furious and XXX, among others.
Vaz said the company had an aggressive launch plan for the channel. While it has started promotions across STAR India network channels, it would be heavily promoted on digital, outdoor, and print media. The company has also created an anthem and a music video for the channel called ‘A hero will rise’.
While media analysts put the English movie genre at Rs 800 crore, Vaz said with the launch of SMAC, the market would grow further and STAR was eying the first and second position in the genre with its two channels.
