JTHJ and SOS Second Week Collections!

By Anant Mathur (November 27, 2012)

It's official! Jab Tak Hai Jaan and Son of Sardaar are both box office flops despite releasing on an extended 6 day Diwali weekend. As usual, it was the big budgets which did both these films in. Jab Tak Hai Jaan had a budget of 50 Crores and managed 92 Crores nett after 2 weeks - giving its distributors approx. 45 crores. Meanwhile, Son of Sardaar with a budget of 80 crores has earned approx. 80 Crores nett and managed a share of 39 Crores for its distributors and will likely generate huge losses for them. It is unlikely that either of these films will cross the 100 crores mark or earn enough revenue to be profitable in the coming weeks. JTHJ may recover some of its losses from satellite and music rights, but there's no hope of recovery for Son of Sardaar... it'll be sending out an SOS.

I have said it many times in previous posts, but I must repeat again... Bollywood cannot release two big budget films in the same week, they cut in on each other's business and if the reviews and word of mouth are not favourable both films suffer. If only JTHJ had released on the Diwali weekend it would have released on many of the screen which were taken by SOS, and with only one choice on Diwali weekend JTHJ would have taken a larger audience and earned more than what it did and perhaps even shattered records. But the coveted Diwali weekend - which is rarely ever profitable to distributors - does not deserve the attention it receives at least not 'till they stop releasing multiple films. For Diwali weekend to be profitable, Bollywood filmmakers need to be smarter (a long stretch I know) and release one film that day. But, as Forrest Gump says "stupid is as stupid does" and you have to be really stupid not to look at historical data which shows whenever 2 or more big budget films are released on Diwali weekend, they both suffer.

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