Salman Haters want to dance on TUBELIGHT's Grave: FORBES

Don Groves ,

CONTRIBUTOR

Probably more so in India than in Hollywood or in other countries with a strong film culture, many fans of Bollywood's top stars seem to get perverse enjoyment when a rival star's film does not achieve blockbuster status.

Those faux culture wars break out with almost every new film from Salman Khan and Shah Rukh Khan, no doubt to the dismay of both actors who are close friends.

Since Salman Khan's Tubelight launched on June 23, myriad professed fans of Shah Rukh Khan have poured scorn on the film on social media, unfairly dismissing it as an embarrassing flop.

In response, Salman Khan admirers are rightly pointing out the Kabir Khan-directed drama is the 11^th film of SK's to cross 100 crore ($15 million) in his 25-year career, an unrivalled achievement. SRK and Akshay Kumar have seven films in that club while Aamir Khan has five.

Despite the mean-minded sniping, the 1960s-set saga co-starring Salman Khan's brother Sohail, Zhu Zhu, Matin Rey Tangu and the late Om Puri collected 106.50 crore ($16 million) in its first week on 4,400 screens in India.

Chennai-based analyst Ramesh Bala forecasts a lifetime total of 150 score ($22.5 million) while Bollywood Hungama's Joginder Tuteja thinks it may struggle to beat Raees, the crime thriller starring SRK which ended up earning 137.51 crore ($20.6 million) earlier this year.

The social media attacks on Tubelight from some devotees of Shah Rukh are rather paradoxical because their hero plays a pivotal cameo in the film.

Film industry executive Girish Johar acknowledges the turf wars but contends they have zero impact on ticket sales, reasoning, "Fans of actors expressing their happiness on social media because their opposite actor's film has flopped doesn't make a difference to anybody. It's just too miniscule of a percentage to cause any affect. They really don't matter. If the film is good it will run, no matter what."

Analyst Sumit Kadel notes, "Fan wars are very common on social media; the same happened with SRK's Fan."

Meanwhile Salman Khan has revealed some key plot points of Dabanng 3, the third edition of the action movie franchise which started in 2010 in which he plays Inspector Chulbul Pandey. He told DNA, "The story starts with Dabangg 3 in the present and then it goes back to the past, and then comes back to the present day again. It will have a prequel portion, but only as a flashback. So it's Chulbul Pandey now and then - what has gone on in his life before part one and two. The flashback will show how Chulbul Pandey actually became Chulbul Pandey. The remaining part will be about what he's up to now."

https://www.forbes.com/sites/dongroves/2017/06/29/salman-khans-tubelight-shines-on-while-haters-want-to-dance-on-its-grave/#4fefb14e6bd5