Quick answers to the following questions, stay tuned and refresh the page after 10 minutes. Q. Who has best line up in next year? – Shaggy A. Our pick would be Shah Rukh Khan and Akshay Kumar. Fan and Raees look interesting. Akshay is mixing it up like 2015. Airlift, Housefull 3, Rustom and Namaste England are his four films for 2016. Q. Will Bajrangi Bhaijaan and Prem Ratan Dhan Payo remain 2015’s Top 2 grossers? – Kalia A. Bajrangi Bhaijaan will remain the highest grosser of 2015. Dilwale could be the second highest grosser, but for that it has to find appreciation. Q. Almost all big films are facing clash, is it fair to say 300 crore is impossible for 2016? So overall profit for industry is expected to increase or decrease with clashes? Your 2016 overall business prediction please? – Bhushan Q. Scheduled clashes are not certain clashes. They can still be averted. The result of Bajirao Mastani vs Dilwale, could give us an answer. If both films do well, expect more clashes. If Dilwale wins by a huge margin, others will think twice before taking on SRK or Khans. If the margin isn’t too big, then Shah Rukh / Excel might rethink their decision of clashing with Sultan. Q. Doesn’t FAN have the highest chances of becoming the highest grosser of 2016 as it is the biggest film having solo release, as all others are clashing? Sohom Pramanick A. The insider reports for FAN is terrific, some say the film has shaped up really well. But like we said in the previous question, holiday releases are not certain to clash. They might be averted. Q. General public watches movies for relaxation and entertainment. Then now days why everybody is so obsessed with box office collections rather than the films quality and content? – Riju Basu A. Who doesn’t love numbers? It isn’t just about box office. Aren’t we all curious about who the richest men in the world are, how much they are worth? Or which phone has the highest sales. Even in sport, numbers of Tendulkar or Roger Federer are discussed and compared with others in their sport. For the normal audience who are not interested in fan wars, a higher earning film is one that is watched by more people, which also means a entertaining or ‘liked’ film. For fans, when a film starring their favourite actor breaks records or does well, it’s a feeling that makes them proud and happy. Can’t think of a better way to explain the obsession with numbers. Q. What is the screen count of Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani? A. It will be around 3200 – 3500 for Dilwale and 2000-2200 odd for Bajirao Mastani. Final number will be known only on the Tuesday / Wednesday before release. Screens are still getting booked. Multiplexes have not allotted shows / screens. Q. Can Hrithik’s Mohenjodaro cross the 300 crore in India? This movie has tremendous buzz. What do you think? – Khushee Radhakrishnan A. Depends on the trailer. 300 crore is still very difficult if the word-of-mouth is not excellent and if there is a clash. Q. Is Hrithik capable to give highest grosser like before? – Mishal A. Hrithik is one of the biggest crowd pullers in the industry, he has already delivered a 35 crore single day at the box office. So it’s about getting the content, genre and release date right. Q. What are upcoming films of Salman after Sultan? Which genre appeals most Raees type or Sultan type? A. Salman will be working in a film produced by Atul Agnihotri after Sultan. Can’t take a pick between Raees and Sultan at this point in time. The director of Sultan has said it’s a commercial film, but we need to see the trailer / teaser before commenting. Q. What would it take for non Khan films to consistently release on major festivals as they are the best period to release a film. Would it have to be consistently outperforming Khan films for sometime? Could Bajirao Mastani be the beignning in that direction? Its sort of unfair for only Khan films to release during festive periods. A film like Bahibali 2 deserves a big festival release! – Lisa A. The first step would be to match upto them and not get decimated. Even when the genre was in favour of Son Of Sardaar, it couldn’t outgross Jab Tak Hai Jaan. Overseas, there was no comparison whatsoever. So Bajirao Mastani performing reasonably well, will give others who are willing to take up the fight, some confidence. The other point is, it’s not just the Khans who want festive release, but the trade also wants them to release their films during Eid, Diwali and Christmas. If a film like Bajirao Mastani gets a solo release on Christmas, it won’t be able to generate the kind of ticket sales that a Khan film can or has. Q. Will Emraan Hashmi be able to make a comeback? – Sridhar A. Raaz 4 is his space, should do well. But whether he can make an impact outside the ‘erotic thriller with good songs’ genre, is something that remains to be seen. So far it hasn’t worked. Q. I’m asking you again, Is there any possibility of Dilwale to touch 300cr with extremely positive word-of-mouth? Bicky A. Box office is unpredictable, but it’s highly unlikely. If it does 250 crore, it’ll be huge, considering the clash factor. Q. What will happen to Shahid Kapoor’s career if his movies Udta Punjab and Rangoon get critical acclaim next year and his acting also? What can be box office collection of these movies if liked by public and critics? Please answer this time please? – Anshi Goel A. Critical acclaim alone, unfortunately, isn’t good enough. A film needs to be successful at the box office for investors to have the confidence to invest in Shahid Kapoor films. Since no Shahid film has even crossed the 80 crore mark, producers are unwilling to invest more than 30-40 crore on his films. And with that budget, it’s almost impossible to produce commercial entertainers. He desperately needs a big 100 crore grosser. Udta Punjab and Rangoon are unlikely to achieve those kind of numbers. Q. Can Akshay Kumar win Best Actor of The Year for his Best Performance in Baby? – Aatif A. He hasn’t even been nominated by Stardust this year, which is a shame. Akshay is a terrific actor, arguably the most versatile among superstars. He can slip into any role and do justice to it. But for some strange reason, almost every award show has ignored him over the years. Social media is probably one of the best ways to protest and let the organisers know that Akshay deserves better at award functions. Even Ajay Devgn has been ignored by Stardust this year. As for our pick for the best actor (popular) this year, it has to be Salman Khan for Bajrangi Bhaijaan. That ends our QnA session today. It’s been a long one, nearly 25 questions were answered. And Sunday is supposed to be a holiday? Thankless job.

Q. Who are the most successful director-actor pairs in terms of box office till today? – Mohammed Shah A. Post 1990, the most successful actor – director duo in Bollywood are as follows: Salman Khan and Sooraj Barjatya – 2 All Time Blockbusters, 1 Blockbuster, 1 Super Hit Hrithik Roshan and Rakesh Roshan – 1 All Time Blockbuster, 2 Blockbusters, 1 Super Hit Shah Rukh Khan and Aditya Chopra – 1 All Time Blockbuster, 1 Blockbuster, 1 Super Hit Aamir Khan and Rajkumar Hirani – 2 All Time Blockbusters Salman Khan and Kabir Khan – 1 All Time Blockbuster, 1 Blockbuster Q. Tell me how much occupancy possible on non-holiday? When two movies release on the same day? – Sandeep A. It’s difficult to put a number to occupancy when there is a clash. Because the numbers would vary depending on the film. Dilwale vs Bajirao Mastani, Dilwale will lead by a distance. Sultan vs Raees will be a lot more closer, with Sultan probably having the edge. But assuming your question was specific to the upcoming clash, we expect Dilwale to open at 70-75% and Bajirao Mastani to take a 25-30% opening in the morning. After that the word-of-mouth will come into play at big centres. In most circuits, Dilwale will lead by a distance. It’ll also be the only choice at most single-screens. To be very honest, there is no comparison. Only hope for Bajirao Mastani is good to excellent word-of-mouth. Also, the maximum a film has collecting on a non-holiday is Rs 36 crore – Day 1 business of Dhoom 3. The combined total of both Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani could be in this range. Q. Can today’s Deepika Padukone’s position in industry be compared with Madhuri dixit and Sridevi’s stardom? Although I know she still has a long way to go – Saurabh Chaudhary A. When it comes to box office success, Hema Malini was incredibly successful. Madhuri and Sridevi don’t quite match up. All three are arguably the most ‘complete’ actresses of all time. To include Deepika in the same league or not, is something that is debatable. As far as box office success is concerned, Katrina Kaif too has an excellent hit-ratio, most of her films during her golden period were runaway hits at the box office. She doesn’t get her due credit because she isn’t known for her acting skills. Katrina’s popularity was so high that she managed to deliver a hit (Mere Brother Ki Dulhan), a week after Salman Khan’s Bodyguard released in theatres. Audience came to watch Katrina, not Imran Khan. So as far as popularity is concerned, Katrina is right up there with some of the biggest female stars the industry has ever produced. More praise-worthy when you consider the fact that she is probably the only actress to come from abroad and dominate the industry. Deepika too has been extremely successful. This topic deservers a more detailed article, we will try and publish a Katrina vs Deepika box office analysis soon. Q. Salman was down and out prior to 2009. How has he suddenly become the No 1 star for over 5 years now. He does often repeat his films and south remakes – only recently he made something different like Bajrangi Bhaijaan and Prem Ratan Dhan Payo?- Miz A. Apart from hard work and dedication, Salman has been choosing the right films and releasing them at the right time. When he was doing South Remakes, those films were working at the box office. When negativity towards remakes began to creep in about a couple of years ago, he moved away from it and signed films like Bajrangi Bhaijaan and Prem Ratan Dhan Payo. Like we have mentioned in several other QnA sessions, Salman now looks into every aspect of filmmaking and marketing. He sits with the writer / director during the planning stage, gives his inputs. Works closely with the director during the production stage and even sits on the editing table. He has been in the industry long enough to know what his audience expects from him, and he has been giving them what they want. In return, they are coming out in big numbers to watch his films. Even his failures like Jai Ho are bigger grossers than successful films of many other actors. His success is truly unreal and unimaginable. Back in the Mid-2000s, when we used to review his films on Friday morning, the occupancy wasn’t even 5% for some of his films. Now, there is a queue 3 hours before the show begins.

Q. Which are Top 10 most awaited 2016 films in Bollywood? A. It would be Dangal / Sultan, Raees, Fan, Mohenjo Daro, Housefull 3, Shivaay, Ae Dil Hai Mushkil, Baadshaho and Airlift. From the teasers that have already released, Raees has garnered tremendous appreciation and so has the teaser of Airlift. Most actors who didn’t have a release in 2015, will return with massive films in 2016. It promises to be an exciting year for Bollywood.

Note: We won’t be conducting a QnA session next Sunday, so the next one (after today’s session) would be on December 20 i.e after the release of Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani. Q. Is there still any chance of averting clash between Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani? – Danish Gani A. Not anymore. If either of the two producers were keen on averting the clash, they would have done so by now. Theatres have been booked and with less than 12 days to go, the clash is on. Both Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani will release on 18th December. Q. After Tamasha’s Underperformance at the box office can we say Akshay and Ajay are now ahead of Ranbir Kapoor in terms of Stardom? – Ankit A. As things stand today, Ranbir has fallen behind Varun Dhawan. Even Ranveer Singh could sneak ahead of him if Bajirao Mastani can stand up to the might of Dilwale. The big difference between stars like Akshay Kumar, Ajay Devgn and others like Ranbir Kapoor, is the fan-following that the veteran actors command at smaller centres. It takes years of hard work to gain following at mass centres and the audience in these centres are more ‘faithful’ to their stars – provided they do films that are more commercial. A film like ‘Baby’ won’t garner any interest with Akshay’s core fan base, but when he does ‘Gabbar Is Back’, they come in big numbers. So for stars like Akshay, Ajay, Salman and other superstars, it’s more about balancing the genre to appeal to both masses and city audience. At major cities, the so-called ‘class’ audience are more willing to wait for the response / word-of-mouth to be out, before booking tickets. If the trailer is not liked, even a Imtiaz Ali film starring Ranbir – Deepika doesn’t get a good initial. Also, the word-of-mouth tends to spread faster at bigger cities, which is why there are noticeably drops in the first weekend itself – example Shaandaar, Besharam. Whereas a mass-appealing film can sustain over the weekend and even hold up during the weekdays – e.g Himmatwala. Meanwhile, we will be updating the ‘Top 15 Actors in India‘ article very soon. It was last updated in August. Q. In case of Dilwale – Bajirao Mastani clash, can footfalls lost during weekend be made up during the week? Assume Dilwale gets 3 idiots WOM and has potential for 350 cr. So shouldn’t it get that amount even in clash, irrespective of how Bajirao Mastani does? Say 100 people would have watched Dilwale in solo release. Wouldn’t the same 100 see Dilwale even in clash? If footfalls are not made up the mark, what’s the reason? – KRK A. Achieving 3 Idiots, PK, Bajrangi Bhaijaan word-of-mouth is a dream that very very few films achieve. Films that have been universally liked by every section of the audience are few and far in between. In recent times, most of those films have been directed by Rajkumar Hirani. So expecting Rohit Shetty to pull off a classic, that too from the kind of trailer that we have seen.. is a highly unrealistic expectation to have. Yes, Dilwale can be a wholesome entertainer and if the film is liked by the audience, it could make a huge impact on the business of Bajirao Mastani. As for footfalls, we have said this many times before, not everyone can afford to watch two movies in theatres, that too in the same weekend. So business will definitely be divided. Also, Bajirao Mastani might be a smaller film in comparison, but it most certainly cannot be written off. Sanjay Leela Bhansali has suffered because of Shah Rukh Khan’s Om Shanti Om in the past, so he would be well aware of the consequences. The fact that he is willing to take him on again, has given the trade a feeling that he is supremely confident of his product. Continue Reading and Vote: Top 10 Most Awaited 2016 films in Bollywood? Part 3: Most Successful Actor – Director duo in Bollywood Part 4: 2015 has belonged to which actor? Part 5: Screen count of Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani and 13 other questions answered