Example of chasm in collections between similar Hollywood, Bollywood films.
By The American Bazaar Staff
MUMBAI: After two weeks in theaters worldwide – including in India, the Hrithik Roshan and Katrina Kaif starrer Bang Bang has grossed more than Rs. 300 crores in total collections, but when compared to its Hollywood counterpart Knight and Day, upon which it’s based – it’s meager: the Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz action thriller collected $260 million worldwide.
The chasm between Hollywood and Bollywood films as far as collections at the box office are concerned in remakes is more apparent in this film, than perhaps any other. Both films promised action of one of its kind and delivered, and have been released widely internationally, but by the time Bang Bang is done with its big run at the box office – and that is coming soon with big budget Diwali releases like Happy New Year coming in less than two weeks – it would still have made only a fraction of its Hollywood counterpart.
Interestingly, Roshan, apart from the big hit with Bang Bang, directed by Siddharth Anand and produced by fox Star Studios, has also the distinction now of being the highest paid actor in India, being reportedly paid Rs. 30 crores for the film and that too upfront. The film’s budget is around Rs. 140 crores.
That is in stark contrast to what Cruise did with Knight and Day directed by James Mangold. He agreed to being paid a lower advance fee, with a share of the revenue from the profits. Since the film recouped more than double the amount of its $125 million budget, Cruise is likely to have made much more than money than what he would have received if he had charged upfront.
Of course, one can argue that going by the budget of both the films, Bang Bang certainly has done smartly at the box office, and is likely to even do better than Knight and Day in terms of percentage of investment recouped versus what was put in, by the time it finishes its run at the box office.
However, in an age where Bollywood films now are being opened in more and more theaters internationally, it probably points to weak marketing overseas for Bollywood films which does not try and reach out to mainstream audiences, instead of just trying to get the desis in.
Anyway, one thing that Roshan and Cruise can take away from their respective film: both of them got relatively trashed by critics when it opened four years apart from each other, but still came up trumps at the box office, with the audience lapping up the high octane action sequences.
1 Comment
Fix the title please.
– Bang Bang has raced past Rs. 300 crores, but Knight and Day made “$260” at the box office –
It should be $260 million.