Aditya Dhar’s Dhurandhar: The Revenge is poised for a record-breaking run at the box office, with strong advance bookings and robust paid preview sales boosting confidence among exhibitors.
The film, arriving just months after the success of its first instalment, has already sold over four lakh tickets for its paid previews, which begin on Wednesday from 5pm.
“I hope it breaks the record of Dhurandhar one and hope it turns out to be the first film to cross Rs. 1,000 crore nett box office in Hindi, besides, the contribution from dubbed versions of Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, and Malayalam. I hope that’s an addition to Rs. 1,000 crore,” Kamal Gianchandani, Chief Business Planning & Strategy, PVR INOX Limited, told PTI.
“In terms of box-office, we are looking at Rs 45 to 50 crore nett on Wednesday (pre-release paid previews), which is a weekday, and it’s starting from half-day,” he added.
Gianchandani said advance bookings have been unprecedented, with over one million tickets sold across languages on the PVR INOX platform.
“At PVR INOX, we have not seen this sort of advance booking even pre-COVID-19... The excitement is phenomenal, there’s no precedence. It looks like the film is going to take a massive opening. We are looking at a strong finish to March, and a strong start to April,” he added.
The cinema chain said demand is strong across metro cities including Mumbai, Delhi NCR, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai, as well as Tier-II centres such as Pune, Ahmedabad, Lucknow and Coimbatore.
The current record for paid previews stands at Rs 23 crore, set by Pawan Kalyan’s They Call Him OG, while the opening-day Hindi film record is held by Shah Rukh Khan’s Jawan at Rs 66 crore, according to industry tracker Sacnilk.
Trade analyst Taran Adarsh described the film as a “phenomenon”.
“"In the past, I've seen this craze for 'Sholay' and 'Baahubali 2'. People were keen to know, 'Kattappa ne Baahubali ko kyu mara?' Now, this film has caught the attention of one and all - not just in India but overseas as well. This is a toofan, a tsunami - how do you handle a tsunami?” he said.
“The first part of Dhurandhar was just the trailer. Picture toh abhi baaki hai. All sorts of records will be shattered and new milestones will be set. No one can predict the numbers — even the producers will not be able to. It is a goldmine for investors — they will be laughing all the way to the bank,” he told PTI.
In a first for a Bollywood release, theatres in Mumbai, Pune and Ahmedabad have scheduled post-midnight and early-morning shows ahead of the March 19 release.
In Mumbai, MovieMax Sion will screen the film at 2.15am, 3.15am and 5.30am, while MovieMax Wonder Mall in Thane has shows lined up at 2.15am, 3.00am, 4.20am and 5.20am.
The surge in demand has also impacted programming at Maratha Mandir, which has shifted its long-running 11.30 am show of Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge to 10.00 am from March 18 to accommodate three shows of Dhurandhar: The Revenge.
BookMyShow COO Ashish Saksena projected an opening-day collection of Rs 35 to 40 crore in Hindi.
“The film will set new box office records internationally. The songs were on Spotify's global chart the last time -- the same is expected this time. Music was a big contributor to the first part, and there's curiosity around it this time since they haven't released as much music ahead of the release,” he added.
Produced by Jyoti Deshpande and Lokesh Dhar, the film stars Ranveer Singh as Jaskirat Singh Rangi, who transforms into covert operative Hamza Ali Mazari operating deep inside Pakistan. The sequel traces Mazari’s rise in the Karachi underworld and explores his origins.
R Madhavan, Arjun Rampal, Sanjay Dutt, Sara Arjun and Rakesh Bedi also feature in the film, which will release in Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada and Malayalam.