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The Hindi film box office has a lot to thank its leading ladies this quarter in what could have otherwise been a story of a series of flops. Thanks to Kangana Ranaut's Queen and Sunny Leone's Ragini MMS 2, the first quarter (January to March) for this year in Bollywood saw net box office collections of Rs 525, crore. However this is much lower than last years in the same quarter when the industry had a box office collection of Rs 544 crore.
The two films have contributed a combined collection of Rs 99 crore to the total for the January-March quarter and are both still running strong . While Ragini MMS 2, despite all the criticism has made Rs 46 crore , Queen's has made a box office collection of Rs 53 crore. This number is phenemonal as the two movies were made at a total budget of only Rs 35 crore. Also the two unusual movies have raked in as much together as the most talked about film of the year Salman Khan's Jai Ho, which made only Rs 110 crore in the domestic box office.
Suniel Wadhwa, independent distributor and box office analyst said that as on 30th March total domestic box office collections for the first quarter touched Rs 525 crore. He said that the number of films was more or less the same - 45 in 2013 and 44 in 2014. This year however there have mean more movies which just faded in the box office. As many as ten movies did not recover their money and as many as six movies did not even have box office collections of over Rs 10 crore.
Last year the main main contributors to this colleciton were Disney UTV's Race 2, ABCD - Any Body Can Dance, Kai Po Che, Fox Star Studios' Jolly LLB and Vicom18 Motion Pictures' Special 26. Komal Nahta,editor and publisher of film trade journal Film Information, says, "This quarter has beena clear indication of content driven films working and more importantly, it has brought to the fore the need to deliver exactly what to promise the audience. While the focus on the first weekend was once again very strong, Queen came out a winner bucking the trend royally."
The first big movie of 2014 - Salman Khan starrer Jai Ho failed to break any box office records as it was expected to. Trade pundits expected it to at least do a business Rs 150 to 175 crore, considering it marked the return of Salman Khan to the big screen after Dabangg 2 in December 2012.
The slate of disappointments includes movies like Sholay 3D, One by Two, Gulaab Gang and Bewakoofiyan. However, there were movies like Yaariyaan, The top five grossers of the quarter contributed Rs 227.55 (44.08 per cent) crore to the total pie in 2014 as compared to Rs 309.5 crore (59.2 per cent) in 2013. In contrast, the number of movies to gross below Rs 10 crore in 2013 are a couple more than 2014.
Last year, 6 movies collected less than Rs 10 crore at the box office in their lifetime while this year, already six have made it to the list and by the looks of things, a couple more may be added from the releases on March 28. Also, this year, movies have collected as low as Rs 70 lakh (Miss Lovely) while last year, the minimum collection was Rs 4 crore (David and Jayantibhai ki Love Story).
Looking forward, the April-June quarter seems to be a dull one as far as Bollywood is concerned. With the election looming ahead and the twenty-twenty cricket tournament Indian Premier League taking place, film makers seemed to have shied away from committing to the silver screen next quarter. Last year, one of the biggest hits in recent times - Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani, released right in the middle of the IPL and still managed to make Rs 175 crore at the box office. This year, analysts believe that the chances of such an occurrence is very bleak.
Suniel Wadhwa, independent distributor and box office analyst says, "The second quarter could see another fall as there does not seem to be any film that can do the 175 crore nett business like Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani May is a very quiet month as far as Hindi releases go. There is no doubt that the first six months of 2014 will see Rs 50 crore less business than the same period last year. This coupled with the fact that last year only saw 10% growth it seems like the growth (if any) will be at much more lower levels than the 2010-2012 period."
