‘Adipurush’ Earns $55 Million Worldwide

The latest big Indian film, Adipurush, crashed badly at the ticket windows soon after making a stellar opening last weekend. Thanks to the controversies surrounding the film and objections raised against many aspects of the narrative, the film saw a major dip in the collections right from the second day. It has made gross earning of $55 million worldwide in ten days since the release on June 16. In India, the film has made nett collections of above $34 million over eleven days since its release.

Adipurush features Kriti Sanon as Janaki, Prabhas as Raghav and Sunny Singh as Sesh. Saif Ali Khan plays Lankesh, Ravan from the Hindu mythological epic Ramayan. The film has been directed by Om Raut who previously made Tanhaji The Unsung Warrior and OMG! Oh My God. The film has been co-produced by Retrophiles, UV Creations, and Tseries, alongwith director Raut. It has been produced at an estimated budget of $63 million. The film released in Hindi, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada and Tamil and languages.

The rise and fall of Adipurush

Featuring Bahubali-fame star Prabhas in the lead role, Adipurush made a brilliant opening score of nearly $16 million globally. The collections dipped on the second day itself and registered a steep decline starting Monday. In India, Adipurush recorded around 25% drop in collections on its first Saturday and the first Monday saw a 72% downfall in the collections. It made a weekend total of $33.1 million nett collections worldwide.

Adipurush advance bookings

The makers of Adipurush created much pre-release buzz around the film and promoted it as a film based on Ramayan. Religious sentiments pushed Adipurush to score a high advance booking collection. While the domestic advance collections stood at $600,000 in India. In Australian & New Zealand markets, the film collected $16000 a week ahead of the release.

Adipurush and Controversies

Ever since the first trailer of Adipurush arrived, the film’s journey has been riddled with controversies and roadblocks. When the trailer was widely panned for bad graphics, and wrong portrayal of the lead characters, the producers decided to go back to the editing table and rework on it all.

After the film released, several groups inside and outside India have raised objections. First of all, Nepal stalled screenings of the film, as well as all Hindi films alleging that the film labeled Janaki as India’s daughter, while the mythological epic informs us that she was born in Nepal. It was only a week later that Nepal court lifted the ban and the film saw scan screenings in the country.

Inside India, major opposition parties Congress, Aam Aadmi Party criticised Adipurush for alleged wrongful portrayal of the mythological characters and making fun of them. Even Shiv Sena (UBT) – traditionallty considered a close ally of the ruling BJP – joined the demands for a ban on screening of the film.

A few days after the release, Adipurush writer Manoj Muntashir Shukla and the producers of the film announced that they have decided to take cognisanze of the audience’s views and will change dialogues of the film that people have found objectionable.