[9] Tamil cinema has been noted for its advanced narratives and diverse films, with several productions in the 1990s and early 2000s cutting across ethnic and linguistic barriers.

[12] Over the last quarter of the 20th century, Tamil films established a global presence, enjoying strong box office collections among Tamil-speaking audiences in Sri Lanka, Malaysia, and Singapore.

Tamil films are also distributed throughout the Middle East, Oceania, Europe, North America, parts of Africa, and Japan.

[13][14] The industry also inspired independent filmmaking among Tamil diaspora populations in Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Singapore, and the West.

[15] M. Edwards first screened a selection of silent films at the Victoria Public Hall in Madras in 1897 during the British Raj.

The film scholar Stephen Hughes points out that within a few years there were regular ticketed shows in a hall in Pophams Broadway, started by one Mrs. Klug, but this lasted only for a few months.

This venue boasted a variety of events, including plays in English, Western classical music concerts, and ballroom dances.

He showed short movies in a tent in Esplanade, near the present Parry's Corner, using carbide jet-burners for projection.

Raghupathi Venkaiah Naidu, a successful photographer, took over the equipment after the exhibition and set up a tent cinema near the Madras High Court.

[16] With this equipment, he screened the short films Pearl Fish and Raja's Casket in the Victoria Public Hall.

[20][21][22] Swamikannu Vincent, who had built one of the first cinema halls of South India in Coimbatore, introduced the concept of "Tent Cinema" in which a tent was erected on a stretch of open land close to a town or village to screen the films.

Fascinated by this new entertainment form, an automobile dealer in the Thousand Lights area of Madras, R. Nataraja Mudaliyar, decided to venture into film production.

After a few years in film distribution, he set up a production company in Madras, the General Pictures Corporation, popularly known as GPC.

GPC functioned as a film school and its alumni included names such as Sundara Rao Nadkarni and Jiten Banerji.

Many drama halls had come up in the city where short silent films were screened in the afternoon and plays were enacted in the night.

Narayanan, who had been active during the silent era, founded Srinivasa Cinetone in which his wife worked as the sound recordist.

The second sound studio to come up in Madras was Vel Pictures, started by M. D. Rajan on Eldams Road in the Dunmore bungalow, which belonged to the Raja of Pithapuram.

[24] There is a strong Indian tradition of narrating mythology, history, fairy tales and so on through song and dance.

In 1916, a studio, the first in south India,[citation needed] was set up in Madras at 10 Millers Road, Kilpauk.

Nevertheless, there are few exceptions like Modern Theatres, Gemini Studios, AVM and Sri Thenandal Films that survived beyond 100 productions.

In 2017, opposing the dual taxation of GST (28%) and entertainment tax (30%), Tamilnadu Theatre Owners Association announced indefinite closure of all cinemas in the state from 3 July 2017.

[40] Tamil films enjoy significant patronage in neighbouring Indian states like Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat and New Delhi.

In Kerala and Karnataka the films are directly released in Tamil but in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh they are generally dubbed into Telugu where they have a decent market.

Since Chandralekha, Muthu was the second Tamil film to be dubbed into Japanese (as Mutu: Odoru Maharaja[43]) and grossed a record $1.6 million in 1998.

[52] The distributor purchases theatrical distribution rights from the producer for exhibiting the film in a defined territory.

The distributor performs enhanced functions such as: There are three popular approaches to transfer of distribution rights via distribution contracts: There are four popular approaches to transfer of exhibition rights via exhibition contracts: Film studios in Chennai are bound by legislation, such as the Cinematography Film Rules of 1948,[109] the Cinematography Act of 1952,[110] and the Copyright Act of 1957.