Why KGF: Chapter 2’s performance cannot be compared with Beast: The reason is Vijay, and his image

The superstar is famous for keeping away from media and not talking about his upcoming movies in his home territory, Tamil Nadu. Attending his film’s audio release event and making a speech lasting 20 minutes or more is the most he does in terms of promotion.

Is Vijay arrogant or unsocial, you may wonder. He’s neither. Each regional industry is as vastly diverse as our country itself. The ground rules of stardom and the terms of engagement are also dynamic. In Tamil Nadu, there are superstars and then there is Rajinikanth. The main source of his superstardom is his elusiveness. After a point in Rajinikanth’s career, he hardly made an effort to expand his fan base through media interactions. He did one movie a year and sometimes fans had to wait for two or more years to see him on the big screen. The long waiting period to get a fresh dose of the Rajini-magic was enough to ensure that the release day of his new movie was celebrated with a lot of gusto and gaiety. The fans can’t see Rajinikanth anywhere but on the big screen. This became a defining characteristic of his stardom. It sort of created a template for the younger generation of movie stars. And when a star rarely promotes his movie and yet breaks box office records, it is a sign that he has reached the highest form of stardom in Tamil cinema. And so far only Vijay and Ajith Kumar have managed to successfully adapt this Rajinikanth template.

Vijay and Pooja Hegde in Beast.

In a career spanning over four decades, Vijay has managed to create a market that functions on his terms. Not all stars can command such gravitas at the box office. An aggressive promotion to increase the film’s earnings in the new markets means breaking his image. He owns something more valuable than the few extra crores that his movies could make in the Hindi belt — the status of a marquee demi-god for his fans.

Will Vijay’s approach to promoting movies change in the future? Maybe or maybe not. But, we can’t assume that all south Indian movies should turn in Pushpa-like profits in the Hindi belt. We should not also sneer at the stars who are not crazy about the ‘pan-India hit’ tag for their movies. They are content with their territory and you can’t blame them for not desiring to expand their conquest up north.

Let us also not make the mistake of comparing Yash’s KGF: Chapter 2 box office performance with the Hindi version of Beast. At this stage, the Hindi release of Beast, under the title Raw, is just a formality, carried out maybe due to peer pressure. Beast and KGF 2 belong to two different categories and comparing them is not only unfair to either one of them but also disregards basic ground facts. The cast, the crew and the producers of Beast have neither spent the time, money nor energy like the makers of KGF 2 in promoting the film not just in the north but across the country and world.

Apples and oranges, people.

Beast is due in cinemas on April 13, while KGF 2 will open in cinemas on April 14.