How Prabhas' Adipurush lost box office race to Shah Rukh Khan's Pathaan despite record-breaking start

Adipurush’s opening day numbers were gargantuan, to say the least. Rs 86.75 crore net in India and Rs 126 crore gross worldwide. These are good numbers for a weekend, let alone just one day. The opening ignited hopes that Adipurush would be the summer blockbuster Indian cinema had been waiting for. The fact that it had beaten the last mega hit – Shah Rukh Khan’s Pathaan – by a fair margin went a long way in strengthening those hopes. But alas, Adipurush’s woes soon began and it faded away, quite in contrast to Pathaan.

The tracking of the box office numbers of these two huge films is an exercise in watching the power of word of mouth. Adipurush netted Rs 86.75 crore across all languages on its first day, more than 50% higher than the Rs 57-crore opening day of Pathaan. In Pathaan’s case, 95% of that earning had come from the Hindi version only, which made it all the more susceptible to word of mouth. The variations between different language markets had no impact on its lifetime run.

Negative word of mouth became Adipurush’s bane

But Pathaan had the benefit of positive reviews. Even though it was a masala film, it was almost universally well-liked. It has a Rotten Tomatoes score of 85%, signifying most critics rated it positively. On the other hand, Adipurush has a Rotten Tomatoes score of 11%, one of the lowest ever for any major Indian film. This meant that after the first reactions and reviews were out, spot bookings reduced. Only advance booking, which banked on Prabhas’ star power, sustained the film through its opening weekend. This was evident on Sunday, when Adipurush showed a jump of under 6%. In comparison, Pathaan grew by 14%.

Pathaan had the advantage of long weekend

Adipurush had a normal weekend, spread over three days, which meant that it maximised its earnings in those three days only, as most mega-budget films do. Pathaan had the Republic Day advantage with it. Yash Raj Films very smartly released it a day before the holiday when SRK fans gave it a bumper opening. The positive word of mouth then kicked in to give it a Rs 70-crore day two. And it held well for the remainder of the extended weekend too. This meant that while Pathaan raked in Rs 280.75 crore (domestic) in its opening weekend, despite a higher opening, Adipurush could only manage Rs 221.10 crore.

Adipurush failed the all-important Monday test

How well a film performs depends on how long it can stay in theatres after opening. Many smaller films have defied conventional wisdom to grow by word of mouth and extend their runs. For most of these films, the fall on the first Monday – the first working day after the first weekend – is minimal. That is what sustains the film. Recent examples include The Kashmir Files and Kantara, which had dips of just 1% and 24% on the first Monday.  Big films see bigger drops since the numbers are higher. But anything under 60% is considered ‘healthy’. Pathaan fell by 56%, a respectable figure. To quote a trade idiom, the SRK-starrer passed the Monday test. Adipurush did not. The Prabhas-starrer fell by a whopping 77% on its first Monday. More importantly, it continued to fall by at least 30% each subsequent day. This meant that by the end of its first week, Adipurush’s per-day earning had seen a massive 94% drop. For Pathaan, this figure was 72%.

At the end of week one, Adipurush’s global gross is just over Rs 350 crore. For any film, this would be a big number. But for the Om Raut directorial, the reported budget of Rs 500-600 crore means that it is simply not enough. The film needs more legs to break even and sadly, it does not have any. Just how far Adipurush can go now at the box office is a moot question. Just how big of a loss it will incur its distributors is the more important point t ponder.