Can IIM's really predict a film's success?

Last week a news article said that students of IIM A will be cracking the code of a films' success based on some statistical tools at least during the first three days.With due respect to IIM A which is our country's best B School and one of the best in world,this study on face of it doesnt' make sense.Although it would be wrong to comment on something without knowing about  the tools and how will be they implementing it but the fact is no statistical tool can predict the success of an art form specially films on which viewers' views are so myriad.If the study limits itself to the opening weekend predictions it does make some sense as promotions do play a large role in initial footfalls,but beyond that it does not seem to be possible

We see on a regular basis that we often have different opinions on the same movie when we came out of the theatre,some like it some dont. Also people have different expectations from the same movie,some are more keen on the drama part,some on music,some on comedy/action and so on and not only this sometimes all of us like the movie but for different reasons.Now when something is so much on mercy of human behaviour and likes/dislikes which statistical tool on earth can measure it.I can understand that if a movie is shown to some target groups across all sections of audience for an opinion,some inference can be drawn but no mathematical tool can help in getting an idea about  the success of the movie

Infact,success of most art forms cannot be defined.I personally for instance have always failed to understand that why some paintings are bought at astronomical sums of 1 crore or 5 crore of rupees or why some people are crazy about some international bands and spend months planning about it and willing to shell out a bomb for it but then they must be having some connect with it and like something immensely about it and hence end up doing so.

Predicting a films' future based on some tools is as difficult as predicting a child's future if his parents have invested in his education in the best possible way by sending him to best schools and colleges but what if  he doesnt' study there-will he be able to crack the interviews and get a good job?.He wont-studying in a good college may help him in sitting for a big organization's interview but cant' get him a good job if he is not good enough.The same goes in the case of movies too,a good promotional strategy can get them some footfalls in the first three days but to sustain that,the product needs to be reasonably good

In recent times we have seen cases of movies like Ra.One,Mausam, Raavan,Action Replay and Kites whose promotional strategies were spot on but inspite of that they ended becoming duds simply because they were not good enough,some even dont' even get good openings despite promoting their movies on every possible platform and using all possible means for engaging the audience prior to release

Nevertheless,it would be definitely interesting to see the results of this and whether it works or not and how does the industry react to it.But if it works then its a bad news for us because film makers would concentrate more on their marketing strategies rather than the content of the movies,this anyways is becoming a trend lately and if these tools work it would make sure that content is doomed forever