Copy: It’s been a tame week at the box office with just two notable films releasing last Friday. There’s Ashim Ahluwalia’s much-touted Daddy starring Arjun Rampal who lost oodles of weight and donned prosthetics and make-up to get into the skin of gangster Arun Gawli. And the other one is the Shreyas Talpade’s remake, Poster Boys, of his own Marathi-produced film Poshter Boyz. It's about three men who find themselves accidentally promoting a vasectomy in their village.
For most part, especially in Maharashtra, Daddy had been expected to receive a decent opening. However, things haven’t turned out so well. “[The excitement] has been because of the biopic’s theme,” says Shailesh Kapoor of Ormax Media, a firm specialising in trade insights. “But the whole underworld genre has not been relevant for long.” He admits that Sarkar did capture viewers, but that’s only because of it’s political skew. Film’s like Company and Satya did well several years ago when their stories were of contemporary value. “[The genre] is not something that the young audience is familiar with or interested in,” he says adding that unless there’s a lead like Shah Rukh Khan who pulled off Raees. But despite that, the film went on to make less than what a big star like him ought to snag. Daddy is predicted to end its theatrical run at Rs 12 crore.
Now the original Poshter Boyz, made on a budget of Rs 2 crore, amassed Rs 8.5 crore according to estimated reports. And after its Hindi remake, the film will be made in Telugu too. Already, the Hindi film is miles ahead of Daddy at the box office. Sunny Deol, who stars in Poster Boys, has his fan base in the north but that’s primarily for action and mass films. That equity will rarely transfer to comedy when the actor switches genres, according to Kapoor. For instance, the very mediocre Singh Saab the Great (2013) opened at Rs 4.32 crore, while his latest collected Rs 1.75 crore (according to Box Office India) on the first day. “There’s definitely been some positive reviews,” says Kapoor. “The film is likely to end to Rs 16 to Rs 18 crore.”
The real zinger this week though has been Stephen King’s IT which according to a report from the distributors (Warner Bros Pictures and New Line Cinemas) has opened at Rs 9.7 crore (gross) during the weekend. Previously, we saw something similar with Conjuring, its sequel and more recently, Annabelle: Creation. Hollywood horror is here to stay and also take away audiences from Bollywood films. “It’s [one of the few genres] that Hollywood does better than Indian films,” says Kapoor. Plus, the films get dubbed in regional languages, eventually being released in single screens thus effectively reaching out to a huge base. “The exhibitors and distributors will soon realise it's an interesting opportunity [to bring down Hollywood horror films] and use that to their advantage,” Kapoor concludes.