Elephants Galore In Cinemas Last Week
It was after ages that an elephant film, Junglee, opened last week. In fact, why just a film about elephants, there hadn’t been an A-grade film with any animal made in years! It was a big coincidence then that last week saw the release of not one but two elephant films in India. Besides Junglee, Hollywood’s Dumbo also hit the screens on 29th March. Dumbo is a film about a baby jumbo which has over-sized ears. Both the jumbo films, which released last week, have the pachyderms in abundance. What’s more, both have been directed by Hollywood filmmakers. While Junglee has been helmed by Chuck Russell, Dumbo is directed by Tim Burton.
‘Andhadhun’ Takes China By Storm
If Sriram Raghavan’s Andhadhun created waves in India, it is doing the same in China too. It opened in China to thunderous response on Wednesday (April 3), grossing an equivalent of US $2.95 million in the first two days. That’s an astounding Rs. 20.50 crore in just two days. The collection figure for Friday, which was a national holiday, was $3.45 million! The total for three days was, therefore, $6.40 million. At this rate, the extended first weekend’s gross for Andhadhun in China should be upward of $10 million! Pertinent to note that the film opened in 28,800 screens. The number of screens was increased to 42,900 on Thursday. On Friday, the screen count for the film was 31,000.
Meanwhile, Zee Studios is all geared up to release Mom in China on 10th May on the occasion of Mother’s Day.
Yet Another Winner?
First, it was Pyaar Ka Punchnama. Then came Pyaar Ka Punchnama 2. It was followed by Sonu Ke Titu Ki Sweety. And now Luv Ranjan is coming up with De De Pyaar De. While the first three-named successful films were all directed by Luv, the fourth is his production venture which has been helmed by Akiv Ali. Going by the trailer of De De Pyaar De, it looks like Luv Ranjan has mastered the formula for romcoms. Yes, the trailer of the Ajay Devgan, Tabu and Rakul Preet Singh starrer is so funny that one ends up laughing all through the trailer. And if that is anything to go by, Luv sure has a big winner on his hands. The film is slated for release on 17th May. Luv’s partners in production are Ankur Garg, Bhushan Kumar and Krishan Kumar.
Release Rigmarole
It’s quite ironical that while film stars have invaded the political arena, either as candidates for Lok Sabha seats or as campaigners, ace politician Narendra Modi was unable to enter the film arena. That is to say, Modi’s biopic, PM Narendra Modi, could not release this week, as scheduled. It was not the Election Commission of India which played truant. For, the ECI did not think that its release would be violative of the model code of conduct which is effective during election period. The Vivek Oberoi starrer had to be postponed by a week as it did not get the CBFC certificate in time. In other words, there were minor cuts in the film, offered by the CBFC on Tuesday, April 2, which could not all be submitted the same day. As there were just three days left for the film to hit the screens (on 5th April), it seemed an impossible task for the producers of the film to meet the release date. Postponing the release to next week seemed to be the only option available to the producers who were very keen to get the film to the cinemas before the general elections. It may be recalled that PM Narendra Modi was originally scheduled for release on 12th April but when Karan Johar announced that in order to take advantage of the Mahavir Jayanti holiday on 17th April, he would release his Kalank on 17th (Wednesday) instead of 19th, the makers of the Modi biopic lost no time in advancing the release date by a week, to April 5. However, that was not to be as the film’s certification process took longer than the producers had anticipated. The makers have now decided to get their film on Thursday (11th April) so that they get at least six days before Kalank comes to the cinemas. Had the biopic been slated for release on the usual Friday, it would get just five days in the first week without the opposition of Kalank.
Producers Missing
The trailer of one of the most anticipated films of recent times, Kalank, was released on 3rd April but none of the three producers was present on the momentous occasion. Karan Johar was away in Singapore for the launch of his wax statue at Madame Tussauds and hence could not attend the trailer launch function. The other producer, Sajid Nadiadwala, was also conspicuous by his absence. Vijay Singh, the head honcho of Fox Star Studios, which presents the film, was also missing from the launch event. Of course, senior people of Fox did make it to PVR Juhu for the trailer launch.
Had Karan been around, he would definitely have been the master of ceremonies. In his absence, the compering was done by Varun Dhawan and Alia Bhatt, two of the six lead players of the film. Besides them, the other four lead stars viz. Sanjay Dutt, Madhuri Dixit, Sonakshi Sinha and Aditya Roy Kapur were also present, making the event a very star-studded affair.