Weekly Box Office Analysis And Prediction For Laal Singh Chaddha And Raksha Bandhan By Trade Expert

Trade expert Girish Wankhede writes for Filmibeat on the last week's major releases and this week's prediction at the box office.

This week is the Pre-Festive Release week and so is the solemnity. The week before a festival is usually dull because no producer wants a weekly window of less than 7 days. This week, two biggies are slated for August 11 (Thursday) release, Laal Singh Chaddha and Raksha Bandhan, so no producer of smaller films will plunge into this.

Firstly, it will have one day less from its weekly count and secondly, it would have full chances to be pulled over by Laal Singh Chaddha and Raksha Bandhan. With this incoming clash of the Rakhi and Independence Day weekend, almost all the screens will be filled by these two biggies and consequently leaving no other film to survive.

Sita Ramam and Bimbisara First Week Box Office

In addition to two obscure Hindi releases Haryana and Miami to New York last week, not many took the risk to release their films. While these two sank without any trace, the other noteworthy were two Telugu films - Sita Ramam and Bimbisara.

Sita Ramam features Dulquer Salmaan and Mrunal Thakur. The film has been appreciated by the critics and showed a steady growth. It opened with Rs 6.1 crore; it made Rs 7.25 crore and Rs 8.90 crore on Saturday and Sunday respectively, showing a weekend collection of Rs 22.25 crore.

Bimbisara is another hit in this week. Featuring Kalyan Ram, this epic period drama generated Rs 9.25 crore on Friday, Rs 7.75 crore on Saturday and Rs 8.75 crore on Sunday. The total is Rs 25.75 crore, which is good and looks better in coming week.

Bullet Train First Week Box Office

Hollywood film Bullet Train featuring Brad Pitt was another noteworthy film which was released in India on Thursday, August 4, and thus making it one of the few films which was released one day prior to its US release.

Bullet Train grossed US$62.5 million worldwide in its opening weekend but could not meet the expectations from the Indian Box Office. On Thursday, it made Rs 1 crore, another Rs 1 crore on Friday, Rs 1.25 crore on Saturday and another Rs 1.25 crore on Sunday; thus, totalling its first weekend BO collections to Rs 4.5 crore. This is far too less of what was estimated.

The reason being poor marketing and bad reviews. The visibility was poor with no impactful PR stories. A majority of moviegoers were unaware about the release. The digital marketing was also out of place. This is one classic example of a reasonable film not doing well owing to bad marketing and promotional strategy. Eventually, no buzz was created around Bullet Train and the result shows.

August 11 - Clash of the Titans - Laal Singh Chaddha vs Raksha Bandhan

Laal Singh Chaddha and Raksha Bandhan intend to cash in on the long weekend of 5 days, and both films look upbeat. While the number of shows of Raksha Bandhan will be more owing to its length of 2 hours as compared to Laal Singh Chaddha's length of 2 hours and 39 minutes, the buzz around LSC is bigger. It's Aamir Khan's ambitious release after four years and is expected to do better. The common understanding is that both will score, as both have potential to be blockbusters.

Aamir Khan's box office clashes have always worked for his counter films also, especially the ones starring Sunny Deol - like Ghayal vs Dil, Ghatak vs Raja Hindustani and Gadar: Ek Prem Katha with Lagaan.

Let's see how lucky Akshay Kumar is to fit into the shoes of the inimitable Sunny Deol.