Nautanki Saala, Commando: 1st Weekend Box Office Collections

New release of the week gone by, Nautanki Saala and Commando, pretty much followed the predictable route as they took an opening in the range of 30%. This was expected for both the films, considering the fact that they were largely star-less affairs with word of mouth being the driving force. Also, they were not expected to eat into each other’s business and this is how the results were as well, what with Nautanki Saala scoring well in upmarket multiplexes while Commando finding it’s audience at the single screens.

As a result, both films were pretty much neck to neck over the weekend. Though Commando was slightly better than Nautanki Saala on the opening day, latter caught up on Saturday and then went ahead with sustained momentum on Sunday. Eventually, while Nautanki Saala collected around 13.25 crores in three days, Commando was just a little behind at around 11.15 crores. With word of mouth being decent to good for the target audience, both films would eventually turn out to be decent earners for their makers though they can’t be tagged as clean hits by a large margin.

Still, these films are in green at the bare minimum which means lesser heartburn for Bollywood in general. Also, its lead actors as well as makers have all the right reasons to smile. Ayushmann Khurranna has now given a good account of himself all over again after Vicky Donor. On the other hand Vidyut Jamwal has made a serious statement of being the next action hero all set to be exploited by Bollywood. For Rohan Sippy this is a fair turnaround after the disappointment of Dum Maaro Dum. Meanwhile Vipul Shah has now two back to back action films in his kitty (the other being Force) to keep his business of filmmaking going.

As things stand today, there won’t be substantial drops during the weekdays for either of the films as niche audiences are going for them. While Nautanki Saala, a sophisticated comedy, would do well at select multiplexes, Commando should be making inroads into B and C centres as well in days to come. They have one week though to make maximum moolah since Ek Thi Daayan, which releases next, would make inroads into multiplexes as well as single screen theatres.

Joginder Tuteja tweets @tutejajoginder