THE BOX OFFICE REPORT CARD OF MAJOR RELEASES
Friday, 10th August, 2007
THE BOX OFFICE REPORT CARD OF MAJOR RELEASES:
No single hero or heroine could claim to have had a fulfilling affair with the box office in the first six months of 2007. If Amitabh’s Cheeni Kum at least brought a smile to people’s faces, his Nishabd and Eklavya made his fans a tad sad. ShahRukh Khan, Aamir Khan and Hrithik Roshan were busy shooting and lucky not to have had a single release during the bad phase of the industry. Or maybe, the period was bad because the three superstars did not have a single release. Let’s have a look on for how the first half of 2007 turned out for the stars whose films did hit our cinema screens this year
BHEJA FRY: The sleeper hit of the first half of 2007 was the non-starcast, small budget Bheja Fry. It came almost out of nowhere and took the city multiplex audience by storm, in the process making Vinay Pathak an overnight star. Made at a very modest budget, the comedy earned almost six to seven times that money as net profit. Bheja Fry worked big time in the small-capacity multiplex screens of big cities, but bombed in the big-capacity single screens of big cities. As for smaller towns, the film fared so poorly that most of the cinemas in ‘B’ and ‘C’ class centers refrained from even releasing it. A classic example of one man’s Bheja fry being another man’s poison! Comedies generally work better in the cities, but the jokes in I were so sophisticated that the masses in cities that still have single-screen cinemas, could not appreciate them.
Aap Kaa Surroor: The film which was least expected to find favour with the audience gave the industry reason to smile and those associated with it, reason to laugh all the way to the bank. Himesh Reshammiya’s debut film as hero, Aap Kaa Surroor, was the film that changed the half-yearly report card of the industry. But for this film, the first six months of the year would not have boasted of a single universal hit.
NAMASTEY LONDON: Katrina Kaif wasn’t half as lucky as Abhishek Bachchan. Even after proving that she could act in Vipul Shah’s Namastey London, Salman did not jump to tie the knot with her. Although hot as successful as Guru, Namastey London managed to keep its distributors in good spirits though world distribution rights holders Eros Multimedia didn’t make money. Blame it on the high price (reported to be Rs 34 crore) at which Eros picked up the Akshay-Katrina starred from Vipul Shah and Adlabs. But the fact remains that the film, though it did well, didn’t turn out to be a cash cow for Eros.
But Guru got a lot of critical acclaim and, after Yuva, also directed by Mani Ratnam, it proved conclusively that Abhishek is capable of delivering the goods. Is that why Ash accepted Abhishek’s marriage proposal two days after the release of Guru?
CHEENI KUM: Released in the same week as Shootout was the much smaller Cheeni Kum. While giving a new, talented director, S Balakrishnan, to the industry, the Amitabh-Tabu starrer appealed to city folk. The romantic story of a 60-year-old man and a 30-plus woman made it to the UK box office Top 10 in its first week. It was, perhaps, the aesthetic handling that made Cheeni Kum, with a storyline similar to Nishabd; work at the box-office even though Nishabd was rejected by the audience. While Ramgopal Varma’s film projected the lusty side of love, Cheeni Kum concentrated on the fun side of romance, completely ignoring the physical aspect.
APNE: The three Deols’ first film together, Apne, could not !’ manage an impressive initial in I the last week of June 2007 but it I consolidated its position as days progressed, at least in North India which has always been the Deols’ stronghold. It cost around Rs 21 crore to make and it is expected to do a business of almost a similar amount in India and overseas.
METRO: Another medium-budget film, like Cheeni Kum, which won the audience’s hearts, at least in the metros, was Anurag Basu’s Life in a Metro. But contrary to all expectations, after Shilpa Shetty’s victory in the Celebrity Big Brother reality television show in the UK, her Metro opened to dismal houses there.
THE NAMESAKE: Mira Nair’s The Namesake worked in the major cities of India but more than that, it appealed to Indians and Asians living abroad.
SHOOTOUT AT LOKHANDWALA: The makers of Shootout At Lokhandwala may have shouted themselves hoarse that their underworld flick had hit the bull’s eye but the only circuit in which it actually worked big time was, quite understandably, Bombay. In many other circuits, distributors didn’t lose money but then, they didn’t make money either
TA RA RUM PUM: Frankly, Yash Raj’s Ta Ra Rum Pum, released only a few weeks prior to Jhoom Barabar Jhoom, was also not appreciated by audiences, but the Saif-Rani starrer at least grossed decent collections in the Bombay circuit. Had other circuits behaved as well as Bombay, the film would’ve been classified a hit or, at least, a semi-hit. But that was not to be! Still, after the Jhoom Barabar Jhoom debacle, Ta Ra Rum Pum seems like a ‘”Sholay!
EKLAVYA: The audience gave thumbs down to Vidhu Vinod Chopra’s Eklavya. They simply couldn’t accept superstar Amitabh Bachchan as a mere royal guard in this film, shot largely in Rajasthan. But quite surprisingly, the Rs 20 crore Eklavya caught the fancy of critics like no other film did in the first half of 2007.It was reminiscent of Omkara last year. Omkara, Vishal Bhardwaj’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s Othello, had also won rave reviews but lost out in tl)e box office race. The fate of Chopra’s Eklavya was worse than that of Omkara. All-India distributors lost around Rs 5 crore in the film.
SALAAM-E-ISHQ: Even worse than Jhoom Barabar Jhoom was Nikhil Advani’s multi-starcast disaster, Salaam-E-Ishq. If only the makers had spent money on an editor; it may have inflated the budget by a few lakhs but it would have reduced the losses by a few crores. Yes, Salaam-E-Ishq appeared to be a film sans an editor, so lengthy and boring was it! One felt sorry for Govinda because his was a truly sincere performance in an otherwise mindless enterprise. Even the super-hit songs of Salaam-E-Ishq could not salvage the film with multiple love stories. Because of its fate at the box-office, it was nicknamed Salaam-E-Risk in the industry.
NISHABD: Amitabh Bachchan also faced rejection- Ramgopal Varma’s Nishabd,
The story of a 60+ man falling in love with his own daughter’s best friend. Nishabd evoked disgust in many viewers and there were reports of people walking out of the cinemas mid-way through the film. Even bachchan’s sterling performance couldn’t save from ruin. How important success is for a newcomer was exemplified by Nishabd.
After it’s debacle, its debutante heroine, Jiah bad to sit at home, twiddling her thumbs.
Even mentor Varma did not repeat her in his next
JHOOM BARABAR JHOOM:
What hit the industry very badly this year was the flopping of Yash Raj Films’ Jhooom Barabar Jhooom. Before its release, the film had everything going for it - a rocking title track, the Yash Raj label, a multi-starcast comprising Amitabh Bachchan, Abhishek Bachchan, Preity Zinta, Bobby Deol and Lara Dutta and an enviable promotion campaign. Despite all this, the film took an initial that was far from exciting or encouraging. It was as if audiences had smelt that the film was not what it promised, because it didn’t meet with their approval anywhere. It is the first flop from the Yash Raj stable in 15 years!
