*Bhoomi was chosen to be the re-launch vehicle of Sanjay Dutt on his return from serving a jail sentence. The subject could not have been a romance considering his age and the receding hairline. And, Munnabhai scripts are not something you picked off the shelf!
Omung Kumar earned fame with his direction of Mary Kom and, one must say, that very little of it he merited for his contribution to the film, most of it was media gifted which is to say, he has been overrated.
Omung’s next was Sarbjit, which he also produced, which was a rank bad film. It seemed have been made with the intent of encashing Aishwarya Rai’s face forgetting most of the time about Sarbjit.
But, for the sake of Sunjay Dutt, the idea of Bhoomi, a father daughter story worked.
Considering all things, the director, Omung Kumar, made partly right decision, to cast Dutt according to his age, as the father of a girl of marriageable age. But, the rest of the decision was disastrous. That was to fall back on old-fashioned 1980s films churned out from South where the ‘izzat’ of wife, sister, bhabhi was compromised by the villains. The true hero was then expected to save his family honour.
It made simple thrill seeking audience happy. Movie going has come a long way since.
Bhoomi has turned out to be bad film with the opening response showing indifference of movie goer. The opening day was poor at about Rs 20 million with the Saturday and Sunday remaining stagnant as the film closed its opening weekend with Rs 66 million.
*Worse choice for a maker was to opt for Haseena Parker. This shows a total lack of imagination let alone creativity. When creativity is nil, one looks for such short cuts just to stay afloat in the industry. After all, a film is made for the all India audience! And, how would they identify with a South Mumbai small lane woman who cashed in on the name of her brother, Dawood Ibrahim? Not many earlier and not now after the film.
Shraddha Kapoor mouthing Urdu dialogue with a stuffed mouth comes across as a comedy! The film opened with poor collections of Rs 11 million, failing to improve much over the weekend and collecting Rs 41 million.
Newton, an odd film about an honest officer wanting to conduct free and fair elections in a Naxal affected area, as expected, has an indifferent opening, but the release of the film coincided with the film’s selection as India’s choice for entry at the Oscars. And, that boosts the footfall for the film over the weekend with big leaps. The film, which opened at Rs 9 billion on Friday, had a huge jump in collections on Saturday of Rs 25 million and Rs 32 million on Sunday giving it a decent weekend of Rs 66 million.
*Lucknow Central, a poor idea poorly executed, fails miserably. With a poor opening weekend of Rs 72.5 million, the film could manage to add just three crore for the next four days to end its first week with a total of Rs 103 million.
*Simran, counting on yet another one-woman show from Kangana Ranaut, like Queen, had just about everything going wrong for it. From the script, to the characterisation of Kangana, to direction, just about everything.
The film let the Kangana fans down as it ended its first week with a tally of Rs 145 million. It is another thing that had the film succeeded, it would have given some standing and credibility to the director Hansal Mahta, too.
*Patel Ki Punjabi Shaadi has collected Rs 13 million for its one week. (The film’s weekend collection was Rs 7 million, and not 700 million.)
*Poster Boys collects Rs 15 million for week two taking its two week total to Rs 122.5 million.
*Daddy added Rs 11 million in its week two to take its two week total to Rs 75 million.
