DUNKI AND SALAAR PUT UP DECENT COLLECTIONS BUT DON’T MEET THE EXPECTATIONS
The biggest clash of the year took place last week. Dunki was released on Thursday, December 21 with loads of expectations. But as the trailer was not upto the mark, the film opened at Rs. 28 crores. The opening figure spoke volumes of the stardom of Shah Rukh Khan. Any other actor, with such a trailer, might have had an opening of less than Rs. 20 or even Rs. 15 crores. Word of mouth was mixed and hence, the collections dropped to Rs. 20 crores on Friday. There was a jump on Saturday and Sunday when the film collected Rs. 24.50 crores and Rs. 29 crores respectively. On Christmas holiday, the film earned Rs. 22 crores. On Tuesday, the holiday period got over and the film dropped to single digits, collecting Rs. 9.50 crores. The first-week collections are expected to be around Rs. 150 crores.
Dunki will have an advantage of the coming weekend, which is also an extended one since January 1 falls on Monday. Moreover, there is no release on Friday, January 5. As a result, it’ll have a nice run till January 11. The target for the film will be to cross the collections of The Kerala Story (Rs. 220.84 crores).
Salaar’s Hindi version, on the other hand, was released on Friday, December 22. It also suffered from a weak trailer. But the new promo, released a few days before the release, saved the film to an extent. It opened at Rs. 15.50 crores and remained steady on Saturday with collections of Rs. 16 crores. On Sunday, it jumped to Rs. 20.50 crores while on the Christmas holiday, the film collected Rs. 15.50 crores. Like Dunki, Salaar also collected Rs. 9.50 crores on Tuesday.
Salaar’s first week collections will be around Rs. 94-95 crores and the target should be to cross Adipurush’s lifetime collections, that is, Rs. 127.11 crores. Even Salaar’s word of mouth is mixed which has prevented it from having smashing collections.
Meanwhile, the exhibition sector saw a bloodbath like never before. Dunki’s distributors didn’t allow single-screen theatres to screen both films. They wanted these theatres to play all the shows of Dunki. Those who refused were not allowed to play the film. Hence, in an unusual scenario, while some single-screen cinema halls played Dunki, the rest opted for Salaar. Fan wars also reached insane levels on social media.