Among the 24 crafts of cinema, if you are asked to name that one profile which is the most riskiest and thankless then you can attribute that honour to the role of a producer. Yes, it is the producer who has the toughest time after starting a movie. It takes years of experience to get somewhere in the circuit.
While that may be so, the situation of the small time producers is quite pathetic. It has become more or less of a norm that if the budget of the film is below 1 crore, it means there is some chance to recover it. Anything above that means the producer is in some really major risk.
The film pundits are now suggesting that any project with new faces should be around 50 lakhs and only then there is some chance of recovering what has been invested. As such, Tollywood has got a strong share of producers but it is always the small budget producers who are struggling for survival.