Yash Raj Films delivered a biggie with War in October 2019 which emerged as a huge blockbuster. The film scored a half-century on the first day and then went on to enter the Rs. 300 Crore Club. However, the pandemic happened a few months down the line and ever since then, the Hrithik Roshan-Tiger Shroff starrer action thriller War stays on to be the biggest Bollywood earner for more than three years. Well, the record would finally be broken as Pathaan has released and it’s cruising its way into the Rs. 300 Crore Club and has set its eye on Rs. 400 crores and beyond.
Meanwhile, with the astonishing start that Pathaan has taken, the premium production house has now retained its supremacy as the numero uno entity in the world of the Indian film business. Yes, it did have a bad last year when Samrat Prithviraj, Shamshera, and Jayeshbhai Jordaar turned out to be box office disasters. Prior to that Bunty aur Babli 2 and Sandeep aur Pinky Faraar were huge flops as well. With as many as five back-to-back box office failures behind them, they set their eyes on Pathaan to take care of all deficits and emerge victorious.
While one now waits to see how big does the Shah Rukh Khan, Deepika Padukone, and John Abraham starrer turn out to be, as far as delivering the biggest openers in Bollywood is concerned, YRF is reigning supreme. This can well be seen with the kind of supremacy they are demonstrated, what with the Top-3 biggies ever belonging to them (all scoring a half-century each on the first day itself), with as many as 8 such big openers in the Top-20 list. Here are those films with the ones produced by Yash Raj Films highlighted accordingly.
Pathaan – Rs. 57 crores [YRF]
War – Rs. 53.35 crores [YRF]
Thugs of Hindostan – Rs. 52.25 crores [YRF]
Happy New Year – Rs. 44.97 crores
Bharat – Rs. 42.30 crores
Prem Ratan Dhan Payo – Rs. 40.35 crores
Brahmastra – Rs. 37 crores
Sultan – Rs. 36.54 crores [YRF]
Dhoom 3 – Rs. 36.22 crores [YRF]
Sanju – Rs. 34.74 crores
Tiger Zinda Hai – Rs. 34.10 crores [YRF]
Chennai Express – Rs. 33.10 crores
Ek Tha Tiger – Rs. 33 crores [YRF]
Singham Returns – Rs. 32 crores
Golmaal Again – Rs. 30.14 crores
Dangal – Rs. 29.78 crores
Mission Mangal – Rs. 29.16 crores
Bang Bang – Rs. 27.54 crores
Bajrangi Bhaijaan – Rs. 27.25 crores [YRF]
What’s heartening for them is that it’s their own Pathaan which has gone past Bollywood’s last big opener, War. Next in line is Salman Khan, Katrina Kaif, and Emraan Hashmi starrer Tiger 3 which is a Diwali release and rest assured, the film is already eyeing a record opening of over Rs. 60 crores. After all, when Pathaan can do that on a non-holiday with Rs. 57 crores coming in then why can’t Diwali release Tiger 3 go much bigger with Rs. 65 crores+ target for Tiger 3.
Note: All collections as per production and distribution sources
