The Akshay Kumar fronted historic, Samrat Prithviraj, has recorded a rather low opening weekend at the box office. After clocking Rs 10.70 crore on Friday, the film saw a nominal 15 percent jump on Saturday to collect Rs 12.60 crore. And finally, on the big Sunday, the movie is headed towards collecting in the range of Rs 15.50 to 16.50 crore, to take the opening weekend total around the Rs 40.00 crore mark.
The opening weekend collections are marginally higher than the Sanjay Leela Bhansali directed Gangubai fronted by Alia Bhatt, but lower than the Ranveer Singh sport drama, 83. While the period drama had clocked a weekend in the range of Rs 37.50 crore, the Kabir Singh directorial raked in Rs 44.30 crore through its opening weekend. The collections of Samrat Prithviraj are benefitting due to support from the small belts in India, however, the key markets like Mumbai, West Bengal and the entire Southern belt are not coming on board the film.
Even on Sunday, the tier 1 metros continued to be on the lower side, though places like Gujarat and Delhi did witness a noticeable spike. With a weekend in the vicinity of Rs 40 crore, it's going to be a task for Samrat Prithviraj to get into the big number zone, though it's the hold in collections on Monday will determine the chance it has to enter the Rs 100 crore club in Hindi belts. Ideally, a film of this stature should have been looking at a Monday closer to double digit mark, but given how things are, anything above Rs 7.25 crore will be considered a reasonable result.
From Friday to Sunday, the film has shown an overall jump of approx. 55%. The May 20 release, Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 on the other hand had jumped by almost 70%, which put it in a better position to trend healthy on the weekdays. The hold of collections on Monday will be determined by the mass belts as the city audience just doesn’t seem to be coming on board for the film.
From the production point of view, the movie will be in the black because of YRF’s multi-film deal with satellite and digital partners and irrespective of the theatrical results, and it’s these backend deals that makes YRF among the rare banners whose films seldom lose money. Nonetheless, the theatrical business is always independent of the non-theatrical revenues and after a slow start, it’s the trend from Monday and the lifetime total that will decide the verdict of this Akshay Kumar film. Stay tuned to Pinkvilla for more updates.
Note: These are estimates based on very early trends till evening shows and we will update the article with figures closer to the actuals by mid night.