Vivek Agnihotri says he knew The Vaccine War wouldn't match The Kashmir Files' success: 'It doesn't have the politics'

Vivek Agnihotri’s The Vaccine War has garnered critical acclaim but had not set the cash registers ringing. The film, which deals with how India’s scientists fought all odds to create the country’s first indigenous vaccine against the Covid-19, has earned Rs 7.25 crore net in its first five days. But the filmmaker is not worried at all. In a chat with DNA, Agnihotri says he anticipated this response and isn’t worried as the film has a low budget.

Talking about the praise the film has recieved from the fans and critics alike, the filmmaker says, “There is a lot of critical acclaim. Many critics have given the film four stars. So that’s great news and I am very happy about that. But for me the most important is how the people are receiving in theatres. This is a small film and we always knew that this will grow with word of mouth and now it is, which is a positive sign.”

The Vaccine War earned Rs 85 lakh on its opening day, eventually growing to Rs 2.25 crore on its first Sunday. The growth was good but not quite the fantastic growth his previous film The Kashmir Files had. The National Award-winning film opened at Rs 3.5 crore, growing to Rs 15 crore in just two days. But Agnihotri says he knew The Vaccine War would not replicate that success. “It will be unrealistic on my part to assume that this will grow like The Kashmir Files because that film had reached the collective conscience of every person from top to the bottom,” he says, adding, “This is a science film on vaccines. Honestly, there shouldn’t have been a feature film on this. But we made it because we felt this story needed to be told. But this film does not have that politics. It is a very straightforward, positive, beautiful film. This is a different genre.”

Agnihotri is confident that the film will grow even if the growth is slow. “It will spread very slowly when families watch it, when kids appreciate it. It will have a slow growth but one thing I know is that this film will have a very strong impact on whoever watches it,” he says.

The filmmaker says he chose to keep The Vaccine War's scale small knowing all this, keeping its budget at Rs 10 crore, even lower than The Kashmir Files’ Rs 15 crore cost. He tells us, “Since I knew its scope is not as much, we made this film in Rs 10 crore. We could have made it bigger, kept the budget at Rs 50 crore. But we cut costs and thankfully Nana cut down heavily on his fees. Many came without accepting money for it, which is how we were able to make it for Rs 10 crore. So, I knew that even if it comes to the worst, it will recover that much money at the box office. If you look at it financially, the film already recovered its costs through digital and satellite rights.”

The Vaccine War stars Nana Patekar, Pallavi Joshi,Raima Sen, Sapthami Gowda, Girija Oak, Nivedita Bhattacharya, and Anupam Kher. The film released on September 28 to largely positive reviews.