CHANDNI CHOWK TO CHINA has underperformed and the way it is progressing after a not-so-heartening weekend, the picture is certainly not rosy for this Akshay Kumar starrer. The wheels of fortunes have turned, and how!
In case of this Rohan Sippy produced film, the very idea of having paid previews have gone wrong. The moment first ever show concluded on Thursday night (around 9 PM), SMSs started floating around, most of them from the industry folks. The film was pulled down, and how. The movie was being termed as the disaster of the decade, and not just the year, and it was being pitched much above LOVE STORY 2050, TASHAN, DRONA and RAM GOPAL VARMA KI AAG in terms of ‘disaster quotient’.
The question is – ‘Did CHANDNI CHOWK TO CHINA really deserve this treatment?’. The answer is NO! The film isn’t bad, as it has been made out to be. A decent entertainer, it is an engaging watch and all the backlash that it is currently getting really seems unjustified. In fact it reminds me of the statement that Ram Gopal Varma made after all the media bashing that his AAG got (not that his film was better). He had said – ‘If only all those people who are bad mouthing my film would have actually went to theaters to watch it, the movie would have been a Superhit!’
This is what has happened in case of CHANDNI CHOWK TO CHINA too. The movie was panned by a few media folks at the end of first show, they were joined by others as Thursday night came to a close, the word of mouth started spreading around and the Friday opening took a jolt. That’s it. Headlines started screaming that the movie had failed and it didn’t have any breather to recover on Saturday/Sunday. Since an average 50% odd occupancy in theaters for the weekend was good enough reason for us media folks to announce it’s failure, movie goers too were influenced in a big way.
A vicious circle, it resulted in movie really struggling to find it’s feet. The question which is bound to be raised now is – ‘Can media make or break a film?’
Well, it may not always manage to make it but at times, when luck is really unfavorable for a film maker, it can break a film, as seen in case of CHANDNI CHOWK TO CHINA. GOLMAAL RETURNS was lucky enough to survive in spite of all the media backlash, CHANDNI CHOWK TO CHINA is seen struggling. The quartet of Ajay Devgan, Arshad Warsi, Tusshar Kapoor and Shreyas Talpade didn’t quite provide good enough fodder for making headlines which Akshay Kumar single handedly could.
After all ‘Akshay Kumar is finished’ is much spicier to hear when compared to ‘Ajay Devgan’s return with GOLMAAL fails’, right?.
By Joginder Tuteja
