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An almost complete clip of the entire film was uploaded on video hosting site vimeo



It quickly spread to a few other fringe sites, as well



The links were shared several times over in WhatsApp.

CHENNAI: Video pirates normally have a 24 hour turnaround time before they release a cam print (shot on camera inside a theatre) of a new movie on the Internet. But as we have constantly been reminded, rules don't apply to Rajinikanth.

As early morning shows of Kabali on July 22 got rolling at 4 am, an almost complete version of the entire film was uploaded on the video hosting site Vimeo. The pirate was a user named Peter, whose account had been created a mere minutes before his one, sole work of pirated art was displayed for all and sundry. The time stamp on the video was 5.10 am IST.

Almost as if they were competing with the mysterious Peter, virtual vigilantes of the Tamil film piracy underworld, Tamilrockers.com, put another print up ten minutes later, this time in the form of a torrent.

Needless to say, almost every single person who wasn't able to (or didn't care enough to) catch an early show of Kabali began to watch the much-awaited Rajinikanth film on their mobile phone. Though liberal portions amounting to almost 24 minutes of the 2.32 hour runtime were missing from the leaked print, the video and audio were astonishingly good. It quickly spread to a few other fringe sites as well.

As a result, the torrent was downloaded over 1.6 lakh times and the Vimeo link was visited 1.85 million times within 12 hours of them being uploaded. The links were shared several times over in WhatsApp.

"Despite repeated appeals to the public and constant reminders from people in the film industry, the allure of watching a movie like Kabali on their mobile phone, without spending an exorbitant amount, has hooked a lot of people. It’s terrible," said Saidai Ravi, who heads the Superstar's rasigar mandram (fan club) in Saidapet.

What is surprising is that the producer of Kabali, Kalippuli S Thanu, has not attempted to get the sites shut down instantly. This despite the fact that he had approached the Madras High Court earlier in the week to get a blanket ban on over 200 sites such as these to stop the illegal online spread of Kabali. "Report physical and online piracy on claims@antipiracysolutions.org or call 08978650014 #IStandAgainstPiracy #Kabali from #July22," Thanu had tweeted from his production house handle @theVcreations.

There have been rumours floating around that Kabali had been leaked to the dark web a few days ago, especially after the first two minutes were leaked via WhatsApp. But all that did was to add to the craze over securing first day first show tickets for the Rajinikanth-starrer. Special previews were held in the US, UK, Europe, Canada and Malaysia.

A source close to the producer said, "We have taken every measure and a seasoned anti-piracy agency has been engaged. They will find the culprits. The cyber cell of the police have also been very helpful. It is clear that the leak is from one of the overseas premieres in Malaysia." But he could not explain why the sites haven’t been blocked yet. He did add that they were "thrilled' at the trade response, though critical reports and fan reactions have been mixed at best.

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