Samrat Prithviraj starring Akshay Kumar, Manushi Chhillar, Sonu Sood and Sanjay Dutt and directed by Dr. Chandraprakash Dwivedi released in theatres on the 3rd of June, 2022. The film locked horns with a Pan-India Tamil film Vikram starring Kamal Haasan, Vijay Sethupathi and Fahadh Faasil and a Pan-India Telugu film Major starring Adivi Sesh and Saiee Manjrekar.
The Akshay Kumar starrer didn’t fare well over the weekend and faced major drops over the weekdays. The first week’s total stands at a meager Rs. 55 cr and the going will get tougher as it faces competition from Jurassic World: Dominion which has started on a blistering note with Thursday night previews exceeding Samrat Prithviraj’s 7th day.
Samrat Prithviraj had a low opening weekend of Rs. 39 cr and the film dropped to levels beyond sustenance on its weekdays. The Thursday figures for the historical drama are estimated to be around Rs. 3 cr net and there’s not much to said here. Overseas numbers are poor and for a release as wide as Samrat Prithviraj got, it is disastrous.
Jurassic World dominion in its Thursday night previews grossed around Rs. 3.5 cr net which indicates that the Friday numbers will comfortably go past Rs. 10 cr net. The Jurassic franchise has a loyal fan following in India and it was one of the first major Hollywood successes back in the 1990s.
Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 has been very steady at the box office and has continued to rally around the Rs. 2 cr range on the weekdays. The film targets a lifetime number of around Rs. 175 cr net and is a Super-Hit at the box office.
Vikram and Major are doing well in their home market but the numbers from the Hindi dubbed version are not optimum. Both Major and Vikram will end their run sub Rs. 10 cr net in the Hindi markets with Major leading.
Akshay Kumar’s Samrat Prithviraj is based on Chand Bardai’s Prithviraj Raso, an epic poem traced back to the 13th century, which gained major popularity in the 19th century. Points for picking something that would blow with the winds of today. That it would blow over was perhaps not intended, and precisely what leaves us disappointed as we walk out of the theatre. It is a film about war and valour, both of which require less sloganeering and more fighting. If you aren’t put to sleep by the dialogue-baazi and manage to stay awake for the scanty fight scenes to appear, you will be put off by the terrible CGI waiting to greet you there. To think that this is a YRF production!
In Samrat Prithviraj, Sonu Sood plays the putative bard. It is ironic that despite emerging as the mass messiah off screen, Bollywood still brings in Sonu to sing songs of the real heroic hero on screen — Akshay Kumar. It isn’t a solo act though. A blindfolded Sanjay Dutt as the warrior kaka, no connection to Mahabhrarata’s Dhritarashtra although he is the father-figure, whose akhand pratigya is to behead anyone who twirls his moustache before the king, also joins in here and there. While Sonu becomes Akshay’s Bran Stark, foreseeing the future in flashes and, like a soothsayer, warning all around not to meddle with vidhi ka vidhaan. Sanjay resorts to his Munnabhai ways, which sticks out like a sore thumb. By the interval, you wish you could borrow Dutt’s blindfold.
