Tuesday, 10^th June 07:00 PM IST

Economics & Truth Behind Overstated Success Of “Gangs Of Wasseypur”

Anurag Kashyap has huge following among urban audience and he said in past that his films do not perform well at box office as his fans download films and watch it illegally. Don’t know much about that but yes, this time again box office success eluded Kashyap.

There is confusion among audience due to success party of for the film happening last week and huge compliments from critics that whether film is a hit. These days every average film at box office termed as hit at box office. And these venues for success parties might be booked in advance that is why they have to go ahead with the plans irrespective of film’s fate at box office.

Team of GOW was already under pressure as there will be sequel releasing in August so it was obvious to announce that film was a hit. One more important point is that every critic in India should get it by now that reviews have lost credibility. And Cannes parties and participation count for nothing for common audience. First installment of GOW was produced with the budget of 9.4 cr nett. Add 6 cr promotion and advertising cost and full investment was 15.4 cr.

Film has earned 25 cr nett in 3 weeks and will finish around 26.5 cr nett collections by the end of its run. That means film will have a distributor share of 12 cr and producers will get 13-14 cr from theaters. Film earned 6 cr from satellite rights and other streams. This will make full recovery in the region of 18-19 cr. This means a thin profit of 3-4 cr is on the card and that can not be termed as success as it is just break even. And if a film earns such a slim profit even after such a huge promotion (“Vicky Donor”, “Paan Singh Tomar” both had lower promotion budget in comparison to GOW but “Vicky Donor” earned double the money with new star cast and :Paan Singh Tomar” earned 20% more) then it should be termed as disappointment.

If critics do not leave any stone unturned in tearing apart conventional massy films like “Housefull 2”, “Rowdy rathore” and “Dabangg” then they should be honest in admitting that a critically acclaimed film failed for certain reason and mind it that all critically acclaimed films do not fail i.e. “Kahaani”, “Paan Singh Tomar”, “Vicky Donor” and “Ishaqzaade”. Truth hurts but figures reveals all, isn’t it, PUBLIC KEH KE DETI HAI AUR BINA KEHE LETI HAI!