Laal Singh Chaddha has tanked at the box office with its opening day collection being abysmal. According to news reports, the collection on the first day of the Aamir Khan starrer movie Laal Singh Chaddha is reported to be Rs 10-11 crores. It is reported to be the lowest opening that an Aamir Khan movie has seen in the past 13 years.
Reports suggest that in the first half of the opening day, it seemed like the movie would not touch a double-digit opening, however, it picked up slightly in the afternoon and had a double-digit opening. The movie is said to be doing better in Delhi and Punjab but has failed miserably in the rest of the country.
The movie’s opening and just how badly it did is evidenced by the fact that the opening was worse than the Kabir Khan directorial, 83, and the Farhad Samji film, Bachchhan Paandey. On the other hand, the movie did not even come close to opening days for movies that have been mega hits this year. While Laal Singh Chaddha opened at Rs 10-11 crores, RRR had an opening day collection of Rs 20.7 crores and KGF 2 had an opening day collection of 53.95 crores.
According to Bollywood pundits, an Aamir Khan movie should have ideally had an opening of Rs 30 crores. In the worst scenario, it should have not had an opening day collection of less than Rs 20 crores, however, the audience seems to have shunned the movie completely.
Earlier, when PR agencies were doing on overdrive trying to show an uptick in advance booking, Taran Adarsh had tweeted sounding a warning that people should not believe the hype that has been created. Film critic Taran Adarsh has shared that the advance bookings of Lal Singh Chaddha and Akshay Kumar’s Rakshabandhan were way below expectations. Adarsh further added that both the movies need word of mouth and walk-in audience/spot bookings to get a decent opening on Thursday, but clearly, that did not happen.
It is notable here that boycott calls against Aamir Khan’s Lal Singh Chaddha have mired the promotion of the big-budget movie that is the official remake of Tom Hanks’s classic Forrest Gump. Aamir Khan’s anti-India statements in the past, his negative and derogatory portrayal of Hindu Gods in his movie PK and his overtly political statements of the past have all been adding to the prevailing sentiments of rejection among the audience of Hindi cinema.
Even Kareena Kapoor’s past statements of mocking the audience and participating in politically motivated campaigns have stirred negative sentiments against the movie.
YouTuber and film enthusiast Dewansh Singh Rajput published a video review of the film on his YouTube channel in which he made some worrisome allegations against the film. Though he repeatedly acknowledged that the acting by Aamir Khan was up to the mark, Rajput pointed out that the movie had several scenes that were allegedly made to satisfy specific propaganda and were Hinduphobic.
Rajput said several scenes targetted particular religions. The movie showed 84 anti-Sikh riots, emergency, Ram Mandir, Lal Krishna Advani, Kargil war, and 26/11, and they have linked Khan’s character to it.
Rajput pointed out that LSC could not even differentiate between Indian Army personnel and Pakistan’s soldiers or terrorist, whoever that character was, and picked him the safety.
In the movie, there was a scene where LSC and that Pakistani soldier or terrorist were having a conversation. This was the point when LSC realized that that person was from Pakistan, but he continued to have a conversation with him. He further offered to do business with the Pakistani personnel in the film.
In one scene, the Pakistani personnel asked LSC, “I offer namaz and pray, Laal, why don’t you do the same?” LSC replied, “My mother said all this Puja Paath is malaria. It causes riots.”