Hrithik Roshan’s Kaabil has done well in its first extended weekend at the box office, collecting Rs 67.46 crore in the first 5 days of its release. The big days came on Tuesday (holiday for Republic Day) and Saturday.
The film opened very well on Sunday too and business was excellent through the day before the T20 cricket match affected the business of both Kaabil and Raees, 7PM onwards.
Monday will decide where Kaabil goes. Good holds during the weekdays will ensure that Kaabil will retain most of its shows and also get the bigger capacity screens. The audience who watched Raees (which was clearly the first choice in the first weekend) could opt to watch Kaabil in theatres this coming weekend.
If the trend doesn’t fall in favour of the film, the Roshans have only themselves to blame for going ahead with clash and ruining a potential big grosser for Hrithik Roshan. Even a top superstar like Shah Rukh Khan decided to avert the clash with Sultan, quickly realising that noone can challenge the might of Salman Khan during the Eid weekend – even though he had a film that was tailor-made for the Eid period. Raees will lose money too because of the clash, but SRK has clearly won the perception game here which should help him keep the Christmas 2018 weekend all for himself.
Side note: There has been a lot of debate over the ‘inflated’ box office collections of Kaabil and we’ve been talking to a people in the trade about all the figures that have been doing the rounds. We’ve also been gathering collections from various circuits as well as multiplex chains. The actuals or the ‘truth’ lies somewhere in between. The collections are nowhere as low as what’s being quoted as the ‘trade number’, nor is it as high as what the producers have been quoting.
It’s high time for the industry to get an independent credible source, which works with producers, distributors and exhibitors – verifies and reverifies the figures with multiple sources – before putting out the final numbers. Even though it’s impossible to release accurate figures on a daily basis, numbers could be put out after the weekend or at the end of the first week.
In a clash like this where ego, perception and reputation built over entire careers are at stake, absolutely anything is possible. There is no source that’s ‘holier-than-thou’ here. Smart manipulation of figures can happen at every level, even at the exhibitor (theatre) level and those who are willing to shell out money, can get anything done. The smallest of margins can make the good to look excellent and the average to look poor. The game is in the smallest of margins.
More on this soon in a more detailed article.