No clarity on release of Prabhu Deva-starrer Mercury in Tamil Nadu; TPFC strike continues

New age director Karthik Subbaraj had announced in advance that his silent thriller film Mercury with Prabhudeva will be hitting the screens on Friday, 13 April, in all languages. Karthik tweeted - The WORLD PREMIERE of our film, #MERCURY, happens in Los Angeles this Thursday, April 12th at the prestigious @IFFLA!Get your tickets now before they run out!However it is still not clear whether Mercury will rise from Friday in Tamil Nadu theatres.The Tamil Film Producers Council (TFPC) has made it clear that it should not release at a time when producers have stopped new releases from 1 March and are on a standoff with theatres over VPF charges.[caption id="attachment_4427537" align="alignleft" width="380"] Prabhu Deva in Mercury.[/caption]Earlier a Twitter war had erupted between Karthik and other producers over the release of the film. At that time he had said that he is supporting the TFPC strike and decided not to release the Tamil version of the “silent film”.Meanwhile Mercury’s all India rights holders, Pen India limited, are going ahead with the release of the film on 13 April in other parts of the country.A TFPC spokesperson said: “Mercury may be silent film technically, according to its makers, and may not qualify strictly as a Tamil release. But at the end of the day it features artists and technicians from Tamil cinema and at this crucial juncture when the rest of the industry is fully backing our efforts it should not release in Tamil Nadu.”As of now Karthik Subbaraj plans to release the film in Tamil Nadu after the strike is called off. However, its local distributor Trident Arts is trying to sort the issue out. They were hoping the strike would be withdrawn before Tamil Puthandu (New Year) and content-starved theatres in Tamil Nadu would lap it up.Last minute, behind the scene efforts are being made to release the film at least by Saturday (14 April) in Tamil Nadu, from where bulk of the collections are usually obtained. Multiplexes in Chennai city that were supposed to release their weekend programming on Tuesday evening have postponed it by a day, hoping for the 'Mercury' to rise.