NEW DELHI — 'Gadar 2' box office numbers have exceeded INR 173 crore much to the surprise of everyone as initially, it did not seem that the movie would do very well while also having two strong competitors with 'OMG 2' and 'Jailer'.
Initial numbers were expected to be about INR 25 crore, though on its opening day alone the movie surpassed over INR 40 crore, which was a staggering amount, far outpacing all expectations.
Speaking to IANS, film trade expert Karan Taurani said: "I think these numbers are really a big positive surprise as no one had really expected this. One reason I think is that the long weekend of Independence Day when people wanted to go out and outing options in India are limited. The second big reason is that it is a franchise-based film. Part 1 had done phenomenal collections and Part 2 is also doing very well right now because of the franchise."
He continued: "So I think franchise-based content, VFX-based content, patriotic content, these are the things that Hindi cinema needs to move forward towards in order to move back to pre-COVID levels. This is particularly because, in India, Hindi cinema is the only one that is currently at a 20-25 per cent growth rate below pre-COVID levels while the content of other languages and genres have already achieved their pre-COVID momentum and moved beyond that as well."
Asked about weekend and lifetime collections, Karan Taurani said that he expects weekend collections to be INR 230 crore, including collections from Tuesday while lifetime is an estimated INR 350-400 crore. Earlier, trade expert Ramesh Bala had said that the maximum he estimates the film to earn is over INR 500 crore at most.
[bsa_pro_ad_space id=1]Replying to the query whether 'Gadar 2' will enter the INR 1000 crore club he said: "There is very little to almost no chance." Domestically, 'Gadar 2' could at best compete with 'Jailer' and get the same amount, though internationally it won't have any chance.
The reasons for that are because 'Jailer' has a very big audience in the South where ticket prices are also capped as well as an international audience while 'Gadar 2' has little occupancy in the South, little international audience and even in North and other Hindi markets such as Delhi and Mumbai, audiences are choosing to go far 'Jailer'.
Nonetheless, the numbers given by 'Gadar 2' are indeed a very big surprise and a good indicator for Hindi cinema overall.