This Thursday sees the release of Spider:Man - No Way Home starring Tom Holland and then a day later would arrive Allu Arjun’s Pushpa: The Rise. Ever since the resumption of theatres with Sooryavanshi releasing on the day post Diwali, the only other film to have released on a Thursday is Satyameva Jayate 2. That was to avoid a clash with Antim - The Final Truth and in the process take an early lead. In case of the two releases this week, one from Hollywood and another from South, there is no competition per se but still the superhero franchise has chosen to arrive a day earlier.
The film is expected to take the second best start of 2021 post Sooryavanshi and the competition would be against another Hollywood release, Eternals, which too had incidentally opened on the same day post Diwali. Then, despite competition, it had still managed to take an opening day of Rs. 7.35 crore. Now with Spider-Man: No Way Home seeing a solo release and hardly any competition from another film in the running, Chandigarh Kare Aashiqui, it should start in Rs. 15-18 crores range, stay stable on Friday and then shoot off further on Saturday and Sunday.
As for Pushpa: The Rise [Hindi], it would have a lot of work to do since neither the marketing and promotion, nor the release is that huge. Though at one point in time, it had looked that the Allu Arjun starrer would see a huge drive enroute Hindi release, somehow that didn’t quite happen. The awareness too is just about decent and hence it would be all about word of mouth doing the talking. With a huge Bollywood biggie 83 arriving a week later, Pushpa: The Rise has a task cut out for itself. Before all if that though, it has to be seen that how big does it open and as of now, an opening day of Rs. 1-2 crore is on the cards as a best case scenario.
