Youngsters fail, will the superstar deliver? Industry awaits ‘Jab Harry Met Sejal’

It’s no secret now that the industry is going through one of its toughest phases. Most films are failing to take an initial at the box office and those that show a healthy weekend-trend are falling during the weekdays.

The last 3 weeks witnessed the release of three films featuring three rising stars in the industry. The more established Ranbir Kapoor came first with Jagga Jasoos. It was the most expensive film of the three and the biggest failure too.

Next up was Tiger Shroff with the director responsible for giving him his most successful films (Heropanti and Baaghi). Munna Michael took a decent opening at mass centres, but was rejected by the multiplex audience. The film will finish its run with less than half the collections of their last film ‘Baaghi’, which collected 77 crore at the domestic box office.

Last weekend was Arjun Kapoor’s turn to entertain the audience in a family film directed by Anees Bazmee. The opening was dismal, the trend over the weekend was outstanding, but business came down on Monday making it tough for the film.

With the industry desperately in need of a major success, the most consistent box office superstar returns for the second time this year with ‘Jab Harry Met Sejal’. Shah Rukh Khan’s Raees was the only Hindi film this year to record – what can be categorised as an ‘excellent’ box office opening. The film took a 20 crore start inspite of the fact that it was competing against a major film like Hrithik Roshan’s Kaabil.

However, surpassing ‘Raees’ and beating the opening numbers of ‘Tubelight’ will not be easy. While the response to the trailer and promos of ‘Jab Harry Met Sejal’ have been mixed, ‘Raees’ had arguably the best theatrical trailer in a very long time. The interest on the ground for ‘Jab Harry Met Sejal’ is fairly good at major cities, but the hype is nowhere close to ‘Raees’ anywhere, including metro cities.

However, the Shah Rukh Khan factor will come into play on Friday. After all, he is still one of the most loved stars that we have in the country today.

A 20 crore plus start for a film like ‘Jab Harry Met Sejal’ will be considered excellent, while anything below 17 crore will be average and less than 15 crore will be poor considering it has SRK along with one of the top female stars in the country.

The opening weekend of ‘Jab Harry Met Sejal’ will also answer several questions that have been discussed and debated within the industry and trade. Have audiences been saving up on money to watch a big star film? Has online services like Netflix, Amazon Video, Hotstar actually begun to reduce footfalls in theatres? Do romantic comedies still excite the audience?

This and many more questions will be answered as the industry awaits its biggest film since ‘Tubelight’. ‘Jab Harry Met Sejal’ has to collect more than ‘Jagga Jasoos’, ‘Munna Michael’ and ‘Mubarakan’ combined to get to a respectable lifetime total and also recover its costs.

While a strong weekend is important, the collections over the weekdays will probably be more important because most Shah Rukh Khan films in recent times, have opened well but failed to sustain Monday onwards. This time it’ll be even more important as the Imtiaz Ali directed film will be competing against ‘Toilet: Ek Prem Katha’ in its second week.

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126 Comments

  • JHMS will also be flop or average at max lol ,worst year for industry ,only TEPK (due to very low cost) G4 TZH and Judwaa 2 will be hits and only TZH will be only BB this year. WORST YEAR

  • Whatever SRK films have delivered in last year, but one thing is clear that every time sallu and aamir fans are in fear at the time of SRK film release. And indicine I challenge you jhms will collect more than 25cr on Friday.

    • Sallu and Amir fans fear SRK? Lmao even hrithik and ranveer fans don’t fear him anymore. Amir and sallu are giving one blockbuster after another and you guys are still talking about fearing? Lol go look at the comments under a Salman khan video. Mostly SRK fans bashing him. And then go look at the comments under a SRK video. You will only see a few bad comments from sallu fans because most of the other ones don’t give a shit about srks films as long as sallu and Amir give back to back 300ce grossers. Something SRK won’t get anytime soon ? If there’s anyone who is in danger, it’s SRK. Sallu has to give 4-5 tubelight to go down. And let’s not even talk about Amir ? He will crush SRK’s record in the first weekend itself with TOH. TZH will be the highest grosser of the year not JHMS. Write it down.

  • Fan was released on partial holiday and did 19 CR. Actual value would be 16 CR on non holiday and Fan had an AMAZING trailer and a CHARTBUSTER Song both missing from JHMS but family audience might come in bigger no. Than FAN so it opening will be almost similar to fan or 1-2 CR higher that means… 16 to 18 CR
    Audience is no fool in today’s era to watch movie for a star ,they watch only Good Movies

  • GOD! Everyone is making it sound as if we are going into war or something. Just chill guys! Good movies have worked, are working and will always work. Jagga and Munna were CRAP,no need to over analyse, just CRAP. And Mubarakan was decent but featured Arjun Kapoor who doesn’t have a fan following of sorts. So instead of analysing soooooo much, make good movies and we ll always shell out our hard earned money! Best of luck to JHMS :)

  • August is lucky month for SRK…JHMS will be praised i think and It will collect close to 180+ i think…let’s see!!first day 22-24 cr…my prediction

  • The problem with recent movies are its trailers & promos.
    Most of the recent movies have had decent to average promos, that’s the reason many movies recently have had below average opening (Tubelight, Mubarakan, Jagga Jasoos etc).
    Now the problem with JHMS is that it’s promotion has been bad, they first released to Mini Trails which were good bit after that they released 4 more which made it repetitive and killed the buzz.
    Then after this they released the official trailer which didn’t feel fresh at all cuz they had showed all the clips in Mini Trails itself.

  • Mixed responz to trailr? Really.. wait n watch fo 26 plus cr opening.. dnt undrestimate him. Ur pan star was worst than bidi on opening. Foget abt later part.

  • People are not willing to pay money for medicore films and if this will continue dn this will be dangerous for bollywood. so fan ware we should pray the coming next big movies will be succesfull. so stop creating negativity for other stars movies. because not just star suffers with the movie others suffer more.

  • I dnt think or argue about BO
    But in d current situation trade needs some big films to deliver
    #JabHarryMetSejal n #Tepk both needs to b do GOOD business
    Always a SRK fan
    No matter what
    But this time really want an universal appealing film from him
    Hope #Jhms delivers
    Dnt became a negetive person
    We are became so desparate dat we actually celebrate others failure more dan our success
    N each n evry film s failed in dis process
    Grow up stay strong
    Evry star is belong to this grt industry
    Agar Bollywood nahi
    Toh Stars/Fans kuch bhi nahi
    #Cheers

  • Good article . The last 3 months have been terrible in terms of content as well as Box office . Hindi Medium was the biggest success in the month of May . Sachin : A Billion Dreams was a surprise Hit got superb opening and emerged Semi Hit . Half Girlfriend got good opening but failed badly from the 2nd day onwards . Meri Pyari Bindu and Sarkar 3 were destined to fail . Raabta sank without a trace and emerged as a disaster . Tubelight is the biggest disappointment of this year in terms of expectations and perception . Mom got positive response from critics but because of high budget it was unsuccessful . Jagga Jasoos always supposed to be a failure and the same happened . It is a major setback for Ranbir, Anurag Basu, UTV and Katrina Kaif . Munna Michael brought back the team of Tiger Shroff and Sabbir Khan for the 3rd time but they failed . This is the 2nd consecutive failure for Tiger after A Flying Jatt . Mubarakan got positive reviews but crashed badly on Monday . So all in all the industry needs a big hit . SRK is going through a dull phase and now he needs to pull up his socks both in terms of Box Office and Content . Anushka Sharma post PK is going through a purple patch with NH10, Sultan and ADHM . Imtiaz Ali needs a big hit like Love Aaj Kal which was a massive success . SRK is coming back to Romantic Genre after JTHJ . At the moment 20 CR+ opening is looking very tough . The promotional strategy has been bizarre . The idea of releasing Mini Trails was plain rubbish . Neither it increased the buzz nor they were exciting . Ideally the trailer should have been released 1 month before the release date . Some of the songs have been successful such as Radha and Hawayen . Let’s wait and watch !!!!!!!!!!!

  • Audience are saving money to watch big scale or good films

    Had they been saving money for stars Tubelight would have worked

    Only TEPK and Chinkara zinda hai(as its a high scale film not bcoj of Salman) will work

    Gone are those days where films used to run on SRK and Salman name or even take opening

  • My predictions :-
    Opening day – 18cr
    Lifetime :-
    Negative wom – 90cr
    Mixed wom – 120cr
    Positive wom – 150cr
    Extremely positive won – 175cr
    (But i feel that JHMS will have mixed wom nd will collect somewhere around 125cr. Nd also TEPK is arriving on 11th Aug. Its appealing more audience . So JHMS is having less chances of collecting good in 2nd week .)

  • JHMS BOX OFFICE PREDICTION

    First Day – 21 Cr.
    Weekend – 73 Cr.
    Week – 108 Cr.
    Life Time – 142 Cr.
    Verdict – Flop

  • There’s so much in common between between Sachin Tendulkar and Shahrukh Khan – both are self-made, both have been super consistent across a long career and both achieved such high peaks during their career that anything below being No.1 and centuries (100 score for SRT and 100-150 crores BO for SRK) is considered bad. Sachin had this phase 2011 onwards (Post World Cup ’11) and so did SRK (Ra.One onwards) – but still nothing can change the fact that both will remain KINGS in their respective fields forever!

    • Well said…This one is golden tweet

      Sam Worthington’s Avavtar is ATHG but that doesn’t mean he is bigger than Tom Cruise.

      Kangana’s HG>>Akshay’s but Kangana is not bigger than Akki

  • @ indicine give update on number of screens and status of advance booking? Is advance booking satisfactory or below expcetation

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