Like it has been the tradition over the last few weeks, last Friday threw another surprising success. We are obviously talking about Shyam Benegal's Shreyas Talpade and Amrita Rao starrer, WELCOME TO SAJJANPUR. Released at around 80 cinemas of Bombay city and suburbs by UTV Motion Pictures, the film was off to an ordinary start. In other circuits, the opening ranged from dull to ordinary. Surprisingly the film picked up substantially based on good word of mouth and WELCOME TO SAJJANPUR ended the weekend having netted an impressive 5.35 crores! The film is expected to be a profitable venture for all concerned, especially in view of the low associated costs. The other two releases, Shona Urvashi's SAAS BAHU AUR SENSEX and Jaideep Varma's HULLA were non starters. While SAAS BAHU AUR SENSEX had a poor to weak start, HULLA had a poor start across India. The two films are expected to be losers though thanks to its 1.50 crore budget Sunil Doshi's HULLA may scrape through to safety.
As we had indicated last week, Vikram Bhatt's 1920 is a true comeback for him as it has done quite well in spite of Ramzan. During the week the horror flick collected 1.15 crores from Bombay, 31 lakhs from Ahmedabad, 2.10 lakhs from Bharuch, 3.10 lakhs from Anand, 2.05 lakhs from Vapi, 1.35 lakhs from Patan, 1 lakh from Navsari, 1.50 lakhs from Mehsana, 6.50 lakhs from Baroda, 7.50 lakhs from Surat, 1.10 lakhs from Himmatnagar, 1.15 lakhs Nadiad, 5 lakhs from Rajkot, 1.75 lakhs from Jamnagar, 3 lakhs from Bhavnagar, 35 lakhs from Pune, 2 lakhs from Kolhapur, 1.15 lakhs from Solapur, 1.65 lakhs from Sangli, 4.75 lakhs from Nasik, 1.25 lakhs from Ahmednagar, 1.20 lakhs from Belgaum, 5.25 lakhs from Goa, 56 lakhs from Delhi city, 8 lakhs from Noida, 7.60 lakhs from Ghaziabad, 3.60 lakhs from Kanpur, 3.55 lakhs from Agra, 1.45 lakhs from Allahabad, 2.10 lakhs from Meerut, 1.85 lakhs from Gorakhpur, 1.70 lakhs from Amritsar, 8.50 lakhs from Gurgaon, 4.35 lakhs from Faridabad, 15 lakhs from Calcutta, 1 lakh from Guwahati, 8 lakhs from Nagpur, 1.30 lakhs from Amravati, 2 lakhs each from Raipur and Durg, 8.30 lakhs from Indore, 14 lakhs from Jaipur, 1.35 lakhs from Jodhpur, 1.50 lakhs from Bikaner, 2.80 lakhs from Hyderabad, 2.20 lakhs from Aurangabad, 1.30 lakhs from Nanded, 1.25 lakhs from Parbhani and 1.10 lakhs from Mangalore. During its opening week, the starless 1920 has netted a creditable 6 crores from India. The film is already an average at the box–office.
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Planman Motion Pictures' Amitabh Bachchan starrer, THE LAST LEAR (English), is dull except for a few multiplexes. The film collected 15 lakhs from Bombay, 3.80 lakhs from Ahmedabad, 1.05 lakhs from Pune, 16.75 lakhs from Delhi city, 3.85 lakhs from Noida, 5.25 lakhs from Gurgaon, 13.05 lakhs Calcutta, 1 lakh from Nagpur, 1.35 lakhs from Indore and 3.70 lakhs from Hyderabad. In its opening week the Rituparno Ghosh directed film manages a below the mark 1 crore from India. But it was not intended to be a commercial venture in the first place!
Neeraj Pandey's Naseeruddin Shah and Anupam Kher starrer, A WEDNESDAY has picked up quite well at several places and that reflects in the rock steady collections. The film collected 75 lakhs from Bombay, 17 lakhs from Ahmedabad, 3.60 lakhs from Surat, 4 lakhs from Baroda, 1.65 lakhs from Rajkot, 21 lakhs from Pune, 1.25 lakhs from Nasik, 1.55 lakhs from Goa, 20 lakhs from Delhi city, 7.75 lakhs from Noida, 8.50 lakhs from Ghaziabad, 1.15 lakhs from Kanpur, 3.40 lakhs from Lucknow, 1 lakh from Varanasi, 1.50 lakhs each from Chandigarh and Ludhiana, 6.50 lakhs Gurgaon, 2.25 lakhs from Faridabad, 7.25 lakhs from Calcutta, 4.10 lakhs from Nagpur, 1.75 lakhs from Raipur, 3.65 lakhs from Indore, 1 lakh from Bhopal, 6.75 lakhs from Jaipur, 1 lakh from Jodhpur, 1.25 lakhs from Kota, 7.60 lakhs from Hyderabad, 3.65 lakhs from Aurangabad, 10 lakhs from Bangalore, 1 lakh from Mangalore and 2.85 lakhs from Madras. Adding another 2.50 crores, A WEDNESDAY has netted an impressive (for its cost and genre) 5.85 crores in two weeks from India. The film is almost a semi–hit in India.
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Meanwhile Yash Raj's Bipasha, Ranbir, Deepika and Minissha starrer, BACHNA AE HASEENO gets back to its stable ways once again. The film collected 10.60 lakhs from Bombay, 2.75 lakhs from Ahmedabad, 20 lakhs from Delhi city, 2.20 lakhs from Noida, 1 lakh from Ghaziabad, 1.45 lakhs from Kanpur, 1.05 lakhs from Gurgaon, 1 lakh from Nagpur and 3 lakhs from Hyderabad. Adding another 90 lakhs, the 19 crore BACHNA AE HASEENO has so far netted an impressive 36.65 crores in five weeks from India. The Siddharth Anand directed BACHNA AE HASEENO, a clean hit from India, has also performed quite well in the Overseas, grossing 309,404 from UK and $702,166 from US.
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