First weekend performance of latest release
'I See You' was the sole release of the week but as expected it didn't arrive with any kind of bang! In fact let alone the bang, there wasn't even a slight noise of any kind as it opened to a cold response all over. In fact the film's reception was so poor that 'I See You' hardly seemed like an A project with Arjun Rampal in the lead and foreign locales as its strong point. There were always apprehensions about the film taking anything more than a 50% opening but what came as an absolute shocker was near empty houses that welcomed the film. The film has hardly generated any kind of positive response [except for Arjun's performance] from any section of media while audience has hardly watched it to pass their judgment. A poor end to a very good year for Bollywood!
Last week's movies
It was first mentioned in this section that 'Bhagam Bhag' would comfortably out-gross Priyadarshan's biggest success 'Garam Masala'. With an excellent 21 crore + first week, it should be able to do so in 2 or at maximum 3 weeks as the film has proved to be a runaway success for Priyan, Akshay, Govinda and Paresh. Mumbai was tremendous with a 4 crore + total while Delhi that had been thirsting for a true blue masala entertainer for long due to an uneven release of 'Dhoom 2', lapped it up to contribute more than 2 crores. Delhi NCR came third with 1.5 crores in total while Ahmedabad was quite good too with 1 crore +. The film has registered good first week numbers across A, B and C centers, something which is a hall mark of a universal success. With 'I See You' hardly proving to be a competition and no worthwhile release before January 12th [when 'Guru', 'Risk' and 'Anwar' arrive], 'Bhagam Bhag' should prove to be a 'bhag'-away hit. Akshay Kumar has another success under his belt now while Govinda makes a successful comeback, with or without all of his scenes!
From the past
It was quite obvious that 'Kabul Express' won't necessarily take a fall similar to a regular commercial film. A bigger fall in collections was expected and hence after a 7 crore first week, the film slid down to 2.5 crores in collections. Still, no shame here for this extremely well directed film by Kabir Khan who has impressed one and all with his very first feature film and is now much sought after in 2007. The film is now a shade below 10 crores but should manage to drag along due to few more open weeks ahead. The film held on best in Mumbai where it registered 85 lakhs after a 2 crore opening week but is a near washout in Delhi where it garnered just about 3 lakhs. Expect the original DVDs and VCDs of the film to be out in a 3-4 weeks time.
In it's second week, 'Aryan - The Unbreakable' has been completely broken and registered a measly 15 lakhs. At just about 1 crore, it is a disaster for Sohail Khan on the same lines as 'I - Proud To Be Indian'. Sneha Ullal, who started off with a hit in the form of 'Lucky - No Time For Love' now has a miss in 'Aryan - The Unbreakable'.
'Babul' crashed completely in its 3rd week and zero interest shown by anyone from the cast or crew to help in further promoting the film and keeping the audience's interest alive in watching it at theatres further proved that everyone had resigned to fate. With just 1 crore coming from the entire country, a 16.5 crore current total of 'Babul' is just not impressive. The beginning and end of year was just not happy for Amitabh Bachchan as he saw both 'Family - Ties Of Blood' and 'Baabul' performing poorly at the box office.
With no new releases other than 'Bhagam Bhag' working universally at the box office, it was a great opportunity for 'Dhoom 2' to consolidate on its now-biggest-grosser status. Apart from a 21 crore week for 'Bhagam Bhag', 'D2' was the only film to register good numbers as it collected 4 crores in its 5th week. The film did quite well in both Mumbai [65 lakhs] and Delhi [57 lakhs]. Standing firm at 80 crores and still counting, it has set a huge benchmark for newer films to follow. Million dollar question is - will the record be broken in 2007?
'Vivah' is now not just 'a journey from engagement to marriage' but 'a dream journey' for everyone who has been associated with the film. With a nominal 20% fall and the 7th week registering more than 1.5 crore, 'Vivah' is now just a shade below 25 crores. The biggest surprise success of the year gone by.
In the future
'Kudiyon Ka Hai Zamana' is the sole release of the coming week but it is not even getting a decent chain of theatres for itself. This Rekha-Mahima-Kim-Vasundhara starrer chic-flick is not coming at majority of multiplexes which tells the tale. No fireworks whatsoever are expected from the film.