AskIndicine: Quick Question and Answer session!

It’s a quick session, we will be answering a few questions.

Starts in 15 minutes i.e 7:30 PM Indian Standard Time. Post your questions in the comments section below.

Q. Which movie in the near future has the greatest potential to come near PK’s domestic and worldwide records? Bahubali has most probably shifted to 2017. Ishan Gulati

A. For any film to break the record of PK, a lot of things have to fall into place. Apart from the film featuring one of the Top 4 actors in the industry, it has to get these things right – positive word-of-mouth (most important), genre (has to be universally appealing) and release period. Sultan, Raees and Mohenjo Daro have to avert their clashes. For films in 2016, we’d put our money on Dangal.

Q. What are you planning to gift Salman Khan on his 50th birthday?

A. The audience has already given him the biggest gift – 2015 has belonged to him. But personally for Salman, the High Court acquitting him is his biggest 50th birthday gift. Nothing else would matter to him on a personal level.

Q. Is Imran Khan signed any movie yet? Please tell about his next movie – Sohail Khan

A. Nothing after Katti Batti.

Q. What would have been the actual collection of Dilwale if it would released solo?

A. Around 28-29 crore approximately. Could have even crossed the 30 crore mark, provided there were no disruptions of shows. Would have easily been the 2nd highest non-holiday opener of all time.

Q. After seeing results of Bajirao Mastani, Bahubali, etc, how big can Mohenjo Daro be? Can it do 200 crore net business (even with clash?) – Rajkumar Patil

A. Like we have seen with the on-going battle between Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani, clashes between two big films should be avoided. One, the shows get divided, giving the bigger film little or not chance of getting close to putting up a big number on Day 1. So when that happens, the normal audience who don’t understand trade, start comparing the collections of Dilwale with higher collecting films like Prem Ratan Dhan Payo and Bajrangi Bhaijaan. The lower number (21 crore in this case) creates a perception amongst the audience that the film hasn’t been liked.

Clashes should be avoided in the future. A Bang Bang vs Haider is okay. Mohenjo Daro vs Rustom will affect both films and Sultan vs Raees will be suicidal. To answer your question about Mohenjo Daro doing 200 crore during a clash, it’ll depend on content.

Q. In how many days #Dilwale will cross 200 crore borderline? – Zaid

A. When there is possibility of never, we cannot answer this question for now. Depends on the weekend trend and hold on Monday.

Q. How much impact did the intolerance remark by SRK and protests against Bajirao have on Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani? – Gj007

A. Dilwale seems to be the more affected film. There are protests in quite a few places across the country, there are also reports of several shows getting cancelled. Bajirao Mastani, it’s quieter today.

Q. What is the verdict of PRDP? Is it Blockbuster?

A. No, it’s a Super Hit.

Q. Any possibility of increase in number of screens of Dilwale next week as BM is very poor in single screens? – Abhyuday

A. Doesn’t work that way at single-screens. If Bajirao Mastani performs poorly at multiplexes, then Dilwale shows might be increased. It could go the opposite way too, if Dilwale underperforms.

Q. Do you think it is wise to release so many multiplex films in the same month like Airlift, Wazir, Ghayal ONCE AGAIN(IT is both multiplex and single screen) and for KKHH3 to clash with Airlift? Can Akshay be back in 2016 with his impressive line-up?

A. With due respect to all the other films that you mentioned, Airlift is by far the biggest release of January. Ghayal Once Again won’t open well at multiplexes, Sunny isn’t a big star anymore. Kya Kool Hai Hum 3 is for the single-screen audience. Wazir is word-of-mouth film. Akshay hasn’t gone anywhere to ‘be back’ in 2016. The question is about him delivering a big grosser that works Pan-India and is profitable for investors.

Q. Is it true 2nd teaser if Sultan coming on Salman Khan’s Birthday?

A. Yes, there are reports that YRF will be releasing something, just like they did for FAN. The first was an announcement video, not a teaser.

Q. What do you think about Robot 2? Will it be the biggest grossing movie ever?

A. It HAS to be the biggest grosser of all time. There is no choice, else it’s a flop. The makers have confirmed to us that the budget is Rs 350 crore. Even with the entertainment tax advantage in the South, it’ll be difficult. Releases late 2017.

Q. For Last 5 years, SRK has been losing every battle. He should choose good movies otherwise, he will be the next Akshay Kumar.

A. Which battle has he lost, can you be specific? Even his under performers are bigger worldwide grossers than super hit films of many other actors.

Q. What’s the response for Neerja trailer?

A. The response has been very good. It’ll still be a word-of-mouth film. If it’s liked, it’ll work.

Q. @Indicine, I saw your rise and rise.. Today you crossed 1 million traffic in 1 day. Describe in your words. ARK

A. It’s an amazing feeling when so many people visit and read every article that we publish. Don’t think there is any other Bollywood website on the internet that gets so many comments. One other thing we love is the trust that people have in our articles and analysis. After we published that there is going to be QnA, we put a tweet which was very short “AskIndicine http://goo.gl/xi0oHj“. More than 1000 people clicked the link in less than a minute and visited our page. It shows that people like what we write and that’s all that matters. Same applies for the box office analysis. The official figure is out on Twitter and everywhere else, but even if we are late, people still click and come to read our analysis. There are nearly 4000 people on this page at this very moment, refreshing and reading the answers. No better feeling. We would like to thank everyone, heartfelt, even those who call us biased! :)

Q. Is there any effect of intolerance controversy of Shahrukh Khan on opening of Dilwale? – Karan

A. Unfortunately, there is.

Q. Has the outcome of this Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani clash come as surprise for you?

A. A little, yes, because we expected Dilwale to collect about 10% more than it did. Bajirao Mastani was at expected level. Having said that, we didn’t have a clear picture about the release and also the ‘disruptions’ cannot be taken into consideration. Both films have done well on Day 1, it’s all about the next few days now.

Q. How the Dilwale strategy to release it on 18th backfired. Because you need really very good product to sustain and take advantage of upcoming weeks. Dilwale was never expected to be next PK, Bajrangi Bhaijaan. Don’t you think 25th Dec is ideal date? – Sky

A. It’s too early to say the move of releasing the film on 18th December has failed. Both films have performed well on Friday and there is growth on Saturday too. Christmas will only be wasted if the trends are poor Monday onwards. If one or both films don’t work, then in hindsight, we could say one film should have arrived on December 25.

End of QnA. Thanks for posting your questions and reading.