With Shamshera, Ranbir Kapoor makes his appearance on the big screen after four years. He appears in the Sanjay Dutt and Vaani Kapoor movies, which are both directed by Karan Malhotra. The film’s advance early screenings began on Saturday, and since Sunday, ticket sales have changed. To make Shamshera more affordable for the general public, the producers, YRF, have moved forward with a reasonable price strategy. As of Monday morning, PVR, Inox, and Cinepolis, the three national chains, had sold about 5500 seats for Shamshera.
If we include the weekend, the three chains’ advance sales total about 10,000 tickets. Shamshera is a blatantly mainstream movie, thus the walk-in will be quite robust. As an illustration, Samrat Prithviraj’s advance projected a single-digit start, but the opening surged north of 10.50 crore due to a large number of walk-in customers. Samrat Prithviraj had sold 2,000 seats as of Monday AM on PVR, while Shamshera has 2600 tickets sold, a 30% increase. The film’s opening might be at least 30% higher, in the range of 15 crores, if the trend continues up to the day of release.
It wouldn’t surprise if progress picks up in the days to come since the trailer and music have garnered greater feedback. Films like Jug Jugg Jeeyo and Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 are more expensive up front than Shamshera, which is more expensive at the box office. While commercial entertainment relies heavily on walk-ins, multiplex films frequently earn superior box office returns. Therefore, the appropriate point of reference for Shamshera will be commercial movies like Prithviraj and Bachchan Pandey, which received some attention in their day as opposed to other commercial movies that failed to make an impact.
Shamshera will also draw audiences from the general public, as is customary for commercial movies. There will be a segment of the audience who would come to see Ranbir Kapoor in this attire. Ranbir Kapoor is unquestionably the biggest Hindi film star since the debut of Hrithik Roshan (2000). Shamshera checks all the boxes for a blatantly commercial movie, and the fact that Sanjay Dutt is in it will promote the movie as well, so the single screens should have solid walk-ins throughout the day.
There will be many news and rumors about technological advancements falling short of expectations, but mainstream movies have always been about walk-in audiences. Since Shamshera is still in its early stages, it is crucial that it gain traction before its release and maintain it on the first day.
