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The big day is now just a few hours away. The most anticipated movie of the year, Prem Ratan Dhan Payo, is up for release and needless to say, it is the biggest of 2015 as well. So instead of setting up the preamble and talking about the many positives that the Salman Khan, Sooraj Barjatya, Sonam Kapoor and Neil Nitin Mukesh starrer comes with, let’s come to the point straight away.
The film is set to take the biggest opening of the year, and that too by a huge margin. Period.
If one looks at it, the year so far hasn’t been ultra-great as far as the opening day collections are concerned. Not a single movie has breached even the 30 crore mark, leave aside coming anywhere close in the vicinity of 40 crore. As a matter of fact just two films have crossed even the 20 crore mark – Bajrangi Bhaijaan (27.25 crore) and Singh Is Blinng (20.67 crore). Sad, but true.
Hence, while it is a given that Rajshri Productions and Fox Star Studios’ Prem Ratan Dhan Payo would take the biggest opening of the year, the question is – ‘How big?’.
The film is practically the only Hindi film that would be running across the country. This positions it even better than a solo release when a holdover release or two still gets some shows. In case of Prem Ratan Dhan Payo, it is set to be the only film that multiplexes as well as premier single screens would be running. This pretty much discounts the film’s (apparent) disadvantage of a three hour duration, due to which lesser shows may have come in, had there been any other movie in the running as well.
Of course the big post-Diwali day means the film would attract crowds in hordes. Yes, it is not a national holiday but it is expected that many out there would enjoy a long weekend, hence ensuring average footfalls in the range of 70%-75%. All of that means that the film is aiming for an opening day of over 40 crore. Of course these are nice numbers to narrate as they get to challenge the all time highest opening day record of Happy New Year (42.6 crore) that was set last Diwali.
While this would certainly be in contention, practically speaking, anything around 35 crore would be huge too since the film enjoys a four day weekend. Moreover, the film is set to score an all time high day record on Sunday, which is set to be hugest ever. Hence, unless the film has negative reports (which doesn’t seem to be the case), a Blockbuster is on the way. However, before that all eyes are on how big does Thursday turn out to be.
Stay tuned.
Joginder Tuteja tweets @tutejajoginder
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