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Rajkumar Hirani’s Sanju starring Ranbir Kapoor in lead emerged not only the biggest Non-Holiday opener of all time, but also recorded the biggest opening weekend of all time in Bollywood (Excluding Baahubali 2: The Conclusion which stood at 128 crores after its 1st weekend). Both the records were previously held by Salman Khan starrer Tiger Zinda Hai which released during the Christmas Weekend last year. While Sanju was always expected to fare well at the box office, no one really expected it to shatter the opening day and weekend record.
The major factor working in favour of the film was BRAND RAJKUMAR HIRANI, who is easily the biggest director of Bollywood in today’s time. The ace-director had a commendable filmography before the release of Sanju as all his films i.e. Munnabhai MBBS, Lage Raho Munnabhai, 3 Idiots and PK have attained a cult status from the audience. PK, which is considered his weakest film till date by a lot of people is also better than the best films of 95% of Bollywood directors. Rajkumar Hirani’s name is associated with good entertaining cinema, and he is undoubtedly one of the prime reasons to get the audience excited about the film in the metros.
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Of course, the efforts put in by Ranbir Kapoor to slip into the shoes of Sanjay Dutt were also visible to the audience from the promo, and the same played a major role in the opening of the film. It was very easy to become a caricature artist, but Ranbir Kapoor didn’t slip even in a single scene, and his performance backed up with star-power was another driving force for the opening of the film. Had Ranbir Kapoor not looked so convincing as Sanjay Dutt, even Rajkumar Hirani would not have been able to save the film, as this was heavily a performance driven film.
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Hirani has cracked the formula of entertaining the audience by taking them through a roller-coaster ride of laughter and emotions. Since his debut film as a director till today, Hirani has directed 5 films and all of them proved to be massive hits, with each film faring better than the previous release.
Verdicts of Rajkumar Hirani films:
Munnabhai MBBS: Hit
Lage Raho Munnabhai: Hit
3 Idiots: Super-Hit
PK: Super-Hit
Sanju has shown a strong hold in collections on Monday i.e. day 4, and the same has ensured that the film has got legs to sustain in the long run. The audience word of mouth is on the positive side, and as things stand today, the film is on its course to breach past the Rs 300 crore club, and might even challenge Dangal which is currently the biggest bollywood grosser of all time. As mentioned by us in an earlier article, the definition of stardom is slowly changing with the time wherein mere screen presence is not enough to get audience in the cinema hall. For the younger lot of actors, the stardom will be determined by their film choices, and given Ranbir’s upcoming film, he is sure to up his value in the market in the coming few years. Slowly and steadily, star-power, holidays and other gimmicks will take a backseat and only the actor who signs on for good universally entertaining films will be labelled the next SUPERSTAR. And well, Hirani is of-course a superstar director in his own league as he has constantly associated himself with quality cinema. His next directorial is Munnabhai 3, and without second thoughts Hirani and not Sanjay Dutt will be face of the film.
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