Brand Aamir struggles amid Laal Singh Chaddha’s tepid box office collection

For a bankable hero who once regularly delivered massive openings at the box office, Aamir Khan is conspicuously missing from the glare of publicity these days. Unlike his peers such as Akshay Kumar, who is visible in every other celebrity-led endorsement on television, Khan remains selective with his choices. More so now after his big-ticket film Laal Singh Chaddha tanked at the box office, especially within India.

Total gross collections of Laal Singh Chaddha in one month are nearing the Rs 130-crore mark, trade analysts said, led in part by the film’s performance in overseas markets. In these territories, the film has cumulatively done a business of around Rs 60 crore in terms of gross collections. The domestic market has contributed around Rs 69 crore in gross collections. On a net basis, India box-office collections are closer to Rs 60 crore in a month, trade experts said.

“For an actor of the calibre of Aamir Khan, these numbers are hardly anything to write home about,” admits Rajender Singh Jyala, chief programming officer at multiplex chain Inox Leisure.

In August, exhibitors were expecting Khan’s movie to break the jinx of Bollywood flops. That didn’t happen despite an 11-day free run between Raksha Bandhan (August 11) and the Janmashtami weekend (August 21) when no major Hindi film was released in theatres. Laal Singh Chaddha’s release date only coincided with Kumar’s Raksha Bandhan, which too flopped at the box office.

“In the domestic market, Laal Singh Chaddha crashed because of issues around content and to some extent the calls to boycott the film. For a strong opener that Aamir is at the box office, the movie managed just about Rs 11-12 crore in first-day collections. In international markets, the response wasn’t great, too, when compared with his films like Dangal and Secret Superstar. They had shattered records, particularly in China,” Jyala says.

Dangal crossed Rs 2,000 crore in total box office collections in 2017, led by the Chinese market, where it did an overall business of Rs 1,400 crore. Secret Superstar amassed Rs 965 crore in 2019, led again by China where it did a business of around Rs 750 crore, according to trade experts.

While Laal Singh Chaddha hasn’t been released in China yet, the makers hope that whenever it does, the movie would replicate the success of some of Khan’s previous starrers in that country.

The jury is out on Laal Singh Chaddha’s fate in China.

“Girl empowerment has been a strong theme that has clicked for Aamir in the China market. Laal Singh Chaddha is a remake of the Hollywood film Forrest Gump.

I am not sure how it will do in China, whenever it is released,” says trade analyst Komal Nahta.

Brand managers are also ambivalent, since box-office success or failure is inextricably linked to the brand value of a movie star. In Khan’s case, his asking price is at least Rs 5-6 crore per brand annually at the moment, say celebrity managers, who reason that he has consistently positioned himself as a cerebral actor who is careful with his choices of films and brands.

Khan is currently visible in ads for Flipkart’s PhonePe, AU Small Finance Bank and PharmEasy on television. He has also appeared in ads for Vedantu earlier, though the recent edtech meltdown has led to a reduction in ad spends by companies in the category (including Vedantu).

Other brands that Khan has endorsed in the past include CEAT, Coca-Cola, Samsung, Snapdeal and Tata Play. Snapdeal had dropped Khan as its brand ambassador in 2016 after remarks by the actor on growing intolerance in the country saw the e-commerce player face a consumer backlash. By 2017, the tourism ministry had also dropped Khan from its “Incredible India” campaign.

Celebrity managers say that Khan is not signing any brands at the moment as he comes to terms with Laal Singh Chaddha’s poor show. The movie is estimated to have been made with a budget around Rs 180-200 crore, and the makers are hoping to recover some of its costs from the release of the film on OTT and cable and satellite TV.

While the film will stream on Netflix in October, the winner of the satellite rights have not been announced yet.

Brahmashtra offers hope, but protests begin

The day of reckoning for Brahmashtra, starring newly-weds Ranbir Kapoor and Alia Bhatt, has arrived. And as if on cue, protests against Kapoor have begun for comments he made earlier in favour of consuming beef. The fantasy-adventure film, made at an estimated budget of Rs 300 crore, is releasing in theatres on Friday. Advance bookings for the film, directed by Ayan Mukherji, have already crossed Rs 6 crore in terms of ticket sales, according to exhibitors, and could touch Rs 10 crore before Friday. According to estimates, Brahmashtra could register a record for a Hindi film in 2022 by netting Rs 25-30 crore in first-day collections. Last year, Akshay Kumar’s Sooryavanshi had collected Rs 26 crore on its first day.