Dare-bare Bollywood has beaten a broken-hearted Bond. At least at the city box office. John Abraham’s body beautiful, flaunted true-blueCasino Royale style, has taken the pants off Daniel Craig’s Quantum of Solace. “The start has been good... hope it continues to do well... fingers crossed,” a tense Karan Johar told Metro from Mumbai after Dostana’s first weekend. The much-hyped Bollywood release arrived last Friday with 64 multiplex shows daily and almost blew away all other films. James Bond bore the brunt with the daily multiplex count of Quantum of Solace sliding from 43 to 21 shows. “The audiences haven’t dismissed Quantum of Solace,but they have certainly come looking for the 007 touch and left disappointed. It’s just another action film with a thin plot, not really a Bond movie, and so there is no hope of repeat audience or word-of-mouth buzz,” said a trade analyst. Dostana on the other hand is playing the curiosity-cum-comedy card well. “The movie got off to a flying start and hasn’t stopped soaring, not just for the Karan Johar brand name but also because of its theme (John and Abhishek Bachchan pretend to be gay),” said Vikas Syal, the general manager of INOX (Forum), where nine of the 10 shows on Sunday went house-full. The Dostana party is also on in full swing at Fame (South City) where the 19 daily shows have raked in an average of 70 per cent occupancy over the weekend with the Sunday footfall “one of the best ever” for the eight-month-old Prince Anwar Shah Road property. “We had 17 shows for Karzzzz but we had to bring it down drastically in the second week. With Dostana, we plan to keep as many of the 19 shows as possible,” was the word from Fame (South City). That would be a tough task given the size of Subhash Ghai’s Yuvvraaj, coming this Friday. “We have to take off all the other movies,” revealed Syal from the Elgin Road plex. That means another body blow awaits Bond this weekend. When Casino Royale had come to Calcutta in November 2006, it had ridden out theDhoom:2 storm but this time Bollywood has denied Bond even a quantum of solace. |
Vivek Oberoi:- I am a Tamilian Vivek Oberoi has said he has great affinity for Tamil Nadu Movies and that he makes sure that he visits his grand-parents in Chennai regularly. Vivek Oberoi in an interview to Tamil media earlier had said ‘Naanum Thamizhkarandhan’ (means ‘ I am also a Tamilian ’). Vivek Oberoi earned the good will of Tamil Nadu people when he adopted a Tamil Nadu village devastated by the killer Tsunami in 2004. Vivek’s next two big films have a solid Tamil connection. The immediate ‘ Prince ’ is being dubbed and released in Tamil on April 9. The following ‘ Raktha Charithra ’ by Ram Gopal Varma in which Suriya is also playing an important role is a multi lingual and that too will be released as a direct Tamil version. The most highlighting factor about these films is that Vivek Oberoi will speak Tamil himself for the dubbing. When Suriya and Vikram are learning Hindi for their Bollywood debuts, Vivek Oberoi comes to Kollywood already knowing Tamil. For More
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