'Dunki' vs 'Salaar' Advance Booking Day 1: Shah Rukh Khan-Starrer Surges Ahead, Prabhas' Film Struggles In Hindi Version
'Dunki' vs 'Salaar' advance booking Day 1: Shah Rukh Khan-starrer has surged ahead of Prabhas' upcoming film.
Shah Rukh Khan's 'Dunki' and Prabhas-starrer 'Salaar' are arguably two of the biggest Indian films of 2023. The upcoming movies will be released in theatres within a gap of one day in December 2023. Rajkumar Hirani's 'Dunki', which also stars Taapsee Pannu, Boman Irani, and Vicky Kaushal, will be releasing in theatres on December 21. On the other hand, Prabhas' 'Salaar', directed by Prashanth Neel, which also stars Prithviraj Sukumaran and Shruti Haasan, will be releasing in cinemas on December 22.
As per industry tracker Sacnilk, 'Salaar' has already amassed Rs 3.60 crore through advance bookings, selling 1,54,328 tickets. The bulk of the tickets have been sold in the Telugu version (84,950). In the Hindi version, 'Salaar' has just sold 18,495 tickets.
Coming to 'Dunki', the upcoming Hindi film has sold 1,45,384 tickets, grossing Rs 4.49 crore for Day 1.
It is important to mention that 'Dunki' is just releasing in the Hindi version, while 'Salaar' is releasing in five different languages -- Telugu, Tamil, Hindi, Kannada, and Malayalam.
The advance booking for both 'Dunki' and 'Salaar' opened on December 16. Shah Rukh Khan's recent successes like 'Pathaan' and 'Jawan' give 'Dunki' an edge over Prabhas' 'Salaar'.
For the unversed, Prabhas has given three back-to-back box office flops in the form of 'Saaho', 'Radhe Shyam', and 'Adipurush'.
Earlier, Prashanth Neel said that no filmmaker desires a clash, be it with a newcomer or a veteran like Rajkumar Hirani.
"Clash is not something you ideally want, be it with a newcomer or with the biggest star of Indian cinema. But it is a very unpleasant situation for anybody to move their date to somebody else's date. We also wouldn't want somebody to move to our date when we have announced it a year before. And we also did not want to do it. But that was a logistical decision that was taken only by the production," Prashanth Neel told The Times of India.
"And usually we (me and my team) don't get into the aspects of what the production is going to decide as a release date, because they do not interfere in my process of filmmaking. So I do not interfere in their process of marketing or the release dates, the business aspect," he added.
2023 has witnessed several big box office clashes, including 'Oppenheimer' and 'Barbie', 'Gadar 2' and 'OMG 2', and 'Animal' and 'Sam Bahadur'.
