The countdown has begun for this year’s Eid release. After delivering a hit in Wanted and blockbusters in Dabangg and Ready, the verdict is unanimous: Salman Khan will score big again with Bodyguard. However, the question is: Will Bodyguard surpass expectations?
Judging by the way advance booking has opened across the country in single-screens as well as multiplexes, it is obvious that Bodyguard, too, like Khan’s earlier two movies (Dabangg and Ready), is heading for a record-breaking opening, followed by a record weekend (an extended five-day weekend) and record collections in its first week. Bodyguard will enjoy the widest release, the highest-ever in India, with as many as 2,560 screens.
If distributors and exhibitors in various territories are to be believed, almost 70 per cent tickets are already sold out for the film’s first two days – Wednesday and Thursday – across the country.
Such is the craze for this Salman Khan-Kareena Kapoor starrer that Delhi sold tickets worth Rs 11 lakh for the first two days after advance booking opened. This is almost double the first day advance booking of last year’s Eid release, Dabangg.
The craze in West Bengal is also exceptional. At Paradise cinema in Kolkata, tickets worth Rs 70 lakh were sold on the first day of advance booking. Tickets for the first two days at this cinema are sold out.
And at Novelty cinema in Lucknow, tickets worth Rs 4.3 lakh were sold in the first few hours itself!
The heavy rain in Mumbai did not deter the audience from booking tickets for the first day. At Gaiety in Bandra, and Chandan in Juhu, almost all the shows for the first three days are sold out.
And it’s not just single-screens, every multiplex across the country has experienced major block bookings and around 70 per cent tickets sold so far for first day.
Going by the mania, tradewallahs believe the first day opening for this film will be humungous and may exceed Rs 15 crore.
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