Just like it happened in the weekend, the trend of big bucks continued for Bollywood in the weekdays as well, hence resulting in an all time high Week One at theaters.
In its opening weekend, Dilwale (64.09) and Bajirao Mastani (46.77) had come together to bring on 110.86 crore, hence surpassing the Dhoom 3 record of 107.61 that was established two years back.
The relentless pace of good moolah coming in has kept the exhibitors smiling all over again, as audience kept stepping in theaters during weekdays too. While Dilwale kept minting money with its first week collections reading 102.65 crore, it was the superb pace picked by Bajirao Mastani that was a bigger contributor during the weekdays, hence ending its Week One run at 86.15 crore.
With this, the overall collections read 188.8 crore, which is more than what Dhoom 3 had scored (188 crore) in its first week.
What has to be noted is that the Aamir Khan starrer had enjoyed a massive holiday of 25th December in the middle of the week which had given a huge push to its collections. However, Bajirao Mastani and Dilwale had no such luck, though there would be gains in the ongoing weekend due to the holiday.
That said, another fact which cannot be ignored is that Dhoom 3 accumulated these huge numbers on its own whereas Bajirao Mastani and Dilwale had to come together to take on this might.
As for those in the business, what matters is the flow of moolah and in that aspect, the close of 2015 is turning out to be good news for all involved in the trade. Moreover, the second week accumulated total of both films is set to be quite high and that is expected to be much higher than what Dhoom 3 had scored in its run back in 2013.
Note: All collections as per production and distributor sources
Joginder Tuteja tweets @tutejajoginder