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Depicting the life of wrestler Mahavir Singh Phogat, Aamir Khan is seen holding his opponents tightly in his latest film Dangal to try and pin them down. The actor seems to have a similar grip on the box-office.
Dangal, which comes after a gap of two years, has already raked in ₹106.95 crore as net collections in the opening weekend in the domestic market.
Khan has been a trendsetter at the box office as he is credited with starting the ₹100-crore club and then the ₹300-crore club with his last release PK. Dangal is co-produced by Disney India and Aamir Khan Productions.
Trade analysts and multiplex players said the movie witnessed the highest single-day collections ever at the domestic box office on Sunday. Analyst Komal Nahata said the film earned ₹42.35 crore at the domestic box office on Sunday — the highest for any film. The movie’s Friday and Saturday collections stood at ₹29.78 crore and ₹34.82 crore (net), respectively.
Dangal has grossed an estimated ₹61 crore at the overseas box office so far, while recording the highest grossing weekend for any film in the North America region.
Amrita Pandey, Vice-President, Studios, Disney India, said, “ Dangal has been a very special movie for us. As a studio we aim at making movies that not only entertain but also motivate the audience, and Dangal encompasses that.”
Pandey said the word of mouth for this film has been “extraordinary”. “We feel confident that this will help the film sustain for a longer run.”
The movie has in the process helped the industry beat the demonetisation blues. Some of the recent releases such as Dear Zindagi, Befikre and Kahaani-2 saw a limited number of prints released at the single screens to contain the impact of demonetisation.
However, the producers of Dangal released the film across 4,300 screens in India and about 1,000 screens internationally.
Gautam Dutta, CEO, PVR Cinemas, said Sunday was the biggest day for the multiplex chain in terms of footfalls. “We had 15.5 lakh admissions over the weekend... Even on Monday, which is a working day, we are seeing high occupancy levels of 80 per cent across our cinemas, which is unprecedented,” he added.
All eyes are now on whether the film will set new records in terms of lifetime collections and go past Aamir’s PK.
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