Happy New Year, KICK, Bang Bang Box Office Predictions

Also read: The first part of our box office predictions

Happy New Year: Shah Rukh returns to the movie theaters this Diwali after delivering the then highest grosser of all time in the form of Chennai Express. This time he has teamed up with Farah Khan (with whom he has never delivered a dud). This bodes well for the film. It occupies the highly beneficial Diwali weekend slot and could even enjoy two open weekends. Unlike Krrish 3 last year, HNY gets a perfect release date as Diwali falls on Thursday. Judging by the genre, starcast and release date of Happy New Year it can be safely said that all opening and lifetime records will be in danger. The film, even if its half as entertaining as SRK and Farah’s Main Hoon Na, it will indeed bring happy times for the makers. Box Office Prediction: 250 crore

Positive factors: Successful actor-director duo, Shahrukh Khan and Deepika Padukone’s presence, film’s genre, favourable release date.
Negative factors: Farah Khan is getting worse with every film that she has directed.

Kick: Salman gets back his Eid slot this year with this Sajid Nadiadwala directed film. It is the remake of a huge commercial blockbuster which follows closely with the Dhoom series as far as genre is concerned. It remains to be seen if the North Indian audiences warm up to the story as much as the South Indian audiences. The only thing that is making us a little uncertain is the credentials of Sajid Nadiadwala as a director. The opening records should be broken (or challenged) but the lifetime records will depend on the quality of the film. Box Office Prediction: 240 crore.

Positives: Salman Khan, remake re-scripted by Chetan Bhagat, favourable Eid release date, genre
Negatives: Debutant director, Jacqueline Fernandes (no big female star).

Bang Bang: Hrithik Roshan has had a roller coaster last few months. In 2014 he returns with the action spy commercial adventure Bang Bang that also stars Katrina Kaif. It currently occupies the Gandhi Jayanti date but with the delay in the shooting schedule, due to Hrithik’s ill health, the film could be postponed to a later date. Even though Knight and Day is considered a disappointment in Hollywood, the storyline should transpire well in Bollywood because it is commercial and universal. Expect this to be a box office behemoth regardless of the itchy track record of its director Siddharth Anand. Prediction: 225 crore

Positives: Hrithik Roshan – Katrina Kaif, genre (action, romance), Kahaani director Sujoy Ghosh has re-scripted the Hollywood film
Negatives: Track record of director Siddharth Anand, might not get a perfect release date.

Bombay Velvet: Bombay Velvet is a very difficult film to predict. The budget of this film has gone over 100 crore already but Anurag Kashyap is someone who can be trusted to make all that money count at the end of it all. It is Anurag Kashyap’s first big budget film starring a big star and should end up to be a good film even though the box office fate of Bombay Velvet lies in the balance, because the genre is not very commercial and family audiences are not likely to turn for this film even though it enjoys a Christmas 2014 release. Prediction: 125 crore.

Action Jackson: Ajay Devgn failed to shine in 2013 with both of his films flopping. Prabhu Deva however had a good 2013 with the success of R… Rajkumar. It proved once again that the South Indian director knows his commercial entertainers really well. Action Jackson looks like another run of the mill commercial film and that could go against it. It is also supposed to clash with Akshay Kumar’s Holiday at the box office on 1st May. If the clash takes place both films will suffer. Prediction with clash: 75 crore. Prediction without clash: 105 crore.

Humshakkals: Sajid Khan has managed to catch the irk of the critics with his outlandish films before but he went terribly wrong with the 2013 dud Himmatwala. His fixation with the letter ‘H’ continues with this supposed remake of the classic comedy film Angoor. Sajid and the comedy genre have never gone wrong and Humshakkals should bring him back in the game. June should prove to be a good month for Bollywood with both PK (if it releases) and Humshakkals doing well.
Prediction: 110 crore.

Happy Ending: Saif Ali Khan teams up with his ‘Go Goa Gone’ director in this quirky romantic comedy which also stars Ileana D’cruz. The director duo of Raj Nidimoru and Krishna DK have been known to deliver fine films out of difficult subject matter and we are totally expecting a new take on romance by this team of directors. Happy Ending could end up surprising one and all with its box office collections. Prediction: 80 crore.

Singham 2: Rohit Shetty who delivered a mammoth of a film with Chennai Express is back with his old friend and frequent collaborator in the sequel of the 2011 smash hit Singham. Rohit Shetty has promised his audiences to raise up the stakes in this one and strangely enough this sequel won’t be based on the tamil Singham 2. Rohit commands a special pull amongst the family audiences with his special brand of cinema and we expect them to turn up in huge numbers for Singham 2. Prediction: 150 crore.

Phantom: This film directed by Kabir Khan looks a lot like Ek Tha Tiger with Saif Ali Khan replacing Salman Khan but the subject matter of this film is expected to be a lot less commercial than Ek Tha Tiger. It has been described as a post 26/11 counter-terrorism action drama. We don’t know about you, but that one line synopsis has us interested. Katrina Kaif will also appear in a de-glam avatar in Phantom. Prediction: 105 crore.

Mary Kom: Priyanka Chopra will be portraying the inspirational story of Olympic medalist MC Mary Kom in this Omang Bhandula directed and Sanjay Leela Bhansali produced film. Bhaag Milkha Bhaag showed everyone that a sport film about a real life Indian athlete can work big time and Mary Kom will be looking to follow suit. We are not too confident about the track record of the director and hence we will be a little cautious with our prediction. Having said that, we hope the film captures Mary Kom’s life story properly! Prediction: 55 crore.

Also read: The first part of our box office predictions

Quick Predictions

• The Villain: 70 crore
• Hasee Toh Phasee: 45 crore
• Shaadi Ke Side Effects: 65 crore
• Gulaab Gang: 30 crore
• Creature: 35 crore
• Detective Byomkesh Bakshi: 40 crore
• Humpty Sharma Ki Dulhania: 40 crore

We have two polls below. One for the highest grosser of 2014 and second gives you a chance to pick the surprise 100 crore grosser of 2014 (like Bhaag Milkha Bhaag in 2013 and Barfi in 2012) – a film that is most likely to stand out and make it big.