Ashish Sinha / New Delhi February 22, 2008
If the first four days of box-office collections give any measure of the commercial success of a Hindi-film, then the Hrithik-Aishwarya starrer period film Jodhaa Akbar may create box-office record in both US and India for the first week collections.
For the first four days of its running, Jodhaa Akbar — a UTV Motion Picture release — has collected Rs 38.53 crore from the box office (domestic and international), a close second to last year's Shah Rukh Khan starrer Om Shanti Om — that grossed about Rs 42 crore for the entire week. And there is three days of collections to be added.
Other hot sellers in the box office like yet another Aishwarya-Hrithik starrer Dhoom 2, which was released in November 2006, had total box office collections of Rs 32-33 crore in the first week of its launch.
Of the Rs 38.53 crore collections at the box office, Rs 25.34 crore are from domestic collections and that too from only the collections of Friday, Saturday and Sunday, says a UTV Motion Picture executive.
Also, Jodhaa Akbar is the second highest Bollywood grosser after Om Shanti Om in the US collecting $1.6 million (about Rs 6.40 crore) during the first-four days of its release. Om Shanti Om collected Rs 6.90 crore in the first-four days of its release during Diwali, last year.
In recent times, only Om Shanti Om could cross the Rs 40 crore-first week collections barrier. A close second so far has been Akshay Kumar starrer Welcome as it grossed about Rs 37 crore in the first week of its release, say the film-trade websites. But Jodhaa Akbar has already crossed this mark, says film trade analyst Taran Adarsh.
Commenting about the film's distribution strategy, Siddharth Roy Kapur, director, UTV Motion Pictures said: "Sensing the hype and curiosity created around Jodhaa Akbar in the US market, we released 129 prints of the film, the highest for any Hindi film released in the US. In India, we have released 500 physical prints and 400 digital prints and since there are no major Hindi releases, we expect Jodhaa Akbar to do very well."
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