New Delhi: It has been five months since the onset of 2016 and Bollywood has had quite an eventful run till now - there have been breakups, controversies (some of them even dragged to court rooms), fights, affairs and everything else, except business!
2016 started on a high note but it also turned out to be an apt example of how big guns can misfire.
In terms of box-office numbers, only one film has been able to earn over Rs 100 crore in the domestic market - superstar Akshay Kumar’s ‘Airlift’.
Based on true events, Airlift released on January 22 and raked Rs 127 crore at the ticket window.
Poor box office collections point out that maybe it is time for Bollywood to understand that star power cannot solely help a film swim the tide.
It's content which rules.
One of the greatest examples of the saying Content is The King was movie Nil Battey Sannata. The Swara Bhaskar starrer low budget movie raked up only Rs 5cr at Box office, but got applause from all the quarters.
On the other hand, many highly anticipated big budget movies failed to get audience and couldn’t even come near to the coveted '100-crore' club.
Collections remained abysmally low in Bollywood despite the presence of superstars, big banners, full-fledged promotions and potential stories which could have interested viewers.
There were biopics, thrillers, family drama and new-age films; but nothing kind of worked in five months. Not even the star power of Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Priyanka Chopra and Amitabh Bachchan could help much.
The list include King of Bollywood as well.
Super star Shah Rukh Khan’s stardom could help his film ‘Fan’ rake moolah at the box office. ‘
‘Fan’ earned close to Rs 20 crore on the first day but the buzz died on the first weekend itself. Its lifetime collections stood at Rs 84.17 crore.
Other movies which did well this year are ‘Kapoor & Sons’ (Rs 73.03 core), Baaghi (Rs 76 crore), Neerja (Rs 75.61 crore), Ki And Ka (Rs 51.62 crore), Wazir (Rs 42.00 crore), Ghayal Once Again (Rs 40 crore), Mastizaade (Rs 38crore) and Jai Gangaajal (Rs 38 crore).
Also Read: Members of Rs 100 crore club: These are the highest grossing Bollywood films till date
If we compare these figures to that of last year, Bollywood saw a much better response at the ticket counters.
Movies like ‘Bajrangi Bhaijaan’, ‘Prem Ratan Dhan Payo’, and ‘Baahubali’ earned Rs 320 crores, Rs 207 crores and Rs 302 crores, respectively, to become all time highest Bollywood grosser movies.
In fact, by the end of the fifth month of 2015, Bollywood had already seen a successful sequel, ‘Tanu Weds Manu Returns’ which earned Rs 152 crore and a highly successful film ‘Baby’ which came very close to the 100-crore mark, earning Rs 95 crore.
It is worth a mention that most of the biggies in 2015 were released in the latter part of the year.
This year also Bollywood has high hopes from the movies set to release during the second half of the year.
The biggest release coming next week is ‘Housefull 3’.
Posing of an ensemble cast, trade experts have high hopes from this one, given the success of the ‘Housefull’ franchisee and the pair of Akshay with producer Sajid Nadiadwala.
The ones highly awaited movie this year include Salman Khan starer ‘Sultan’ in July, and Amir Khan's ‘Dangal’ scheduled to release in December.
Only time will tell if the projects of 2016 are able to cope up with the success of 2015 and years before that.
However, the trends so far suggest that Bollywood should and must not take its audience for granted.
Today, movies cannot run solely on the basis of songs, flashy sets and a star-studded caste.
With no shortage of options in terms of avenues of entertainment today, films that lack substance are bound to fail. The audience are smart enough to know how and where to invest their hard earned money when it comes to entertainment. .
Maybe the Hindi film industry needs to wake up and smell the coffee.
