MUFASA: THE LION KING opened with fair collections on the first day with around 7.75-8 crore nett but it was expected to do much better as THE LION KING, which released in 2019, had opened in double digits. Hence, here a double digit initial was expected. The audience is down for Hollywood films in India since 2019 which was pre pandemic but the rise of ticket prices should have compensated for the lesser audience.

The film has a huge ratio of business coming from the South as a big Telugu star dubbed the film in Telugu which has pushed the collections in Nizam/Andhra and around 25% of the all India business is from this circuit alone. The growth here will be limited which will affect the all India growth on Saturday. The film saw poor results in Mumbai and Delhi/UP though they should jump on Saturday but they should be collecting much more. Not only Nizam/Andhra but the other South markets have performed better than the Hindi areas.

There was a Hindi release also with VANVAAS which collected around 60-65 lakhs nett which is a low number but it was also a limited release. The film looks on the lines of the 1983 BLOCKBUSTER film AVATAR but that sort of family cinema for the audiences outside metros is tough today as how do you get that audience out.

The film is not urban and with an actor like Nana Patekar, the emotions will also work for that audience but getting tier 2 and tier 3 audience to the cinemas today without a larger than life film is a near impossible task. Hence, a film like this which is not urban and for the smaller centres becomes for satellite where it should be consumed. The word SHOULD is used as today as when film hits OTT, then piracy does the rounds leaving scraps for satellite.