Bollywood is sinking deeper and deeper and audience seems to be on a divorce pact with theaters this season. Yet another week went by and the numbers pretty much tell the tale that the color red continues to dominate Bollywood report card. AA DEKHEN ZARA, EK – THE POWER OF ONE and VIDESH – HEAVEN ON EARTH have all turned out to be flops, hence making the list further longer when it comes to box office disappointments.
AA DEKHEN ZARA could take some consolation from the fact that it suffered from a poor multiplex release. However, the fact remains that with a first week total that only came close to the 5 crore mark, it couldn’t have covered the distance which would have made it safe in any case. The film did try hard during it’s first weekend and was showing some signs of revival. This was only some flicker of hope though since the weekdays saw a massive decline, hence resulting in the film seeing a free fall. There is hardly any buzz around the Neil Nitin Mukesh and Bipasha Basu starrer in it’s second week, hence making it further difficult for this Jehangir Surti directed film to keep it’s head above water.
EK – THE POWER OF ONE also met with a similar fate at the box office with box office numbers too being in a range similar to that of AA DEKHEN ZARA. A 2 year old film, it carried some expectations of scoring well at the single screens but those hopes too dashed as the week progressed. Yet another flop for Bobby Deol means that he is in serious need of career resurrection. Yet another movie which is hardly in the running in it’s second week, it hasn’t managed to enthuse the multiplex audience at all.
VIDESH – HEAVEN ON EARTH – Now this movie has turned out to be the biggest disaster ever of Preity Zinta’s career. Ok, so she has had some small time films of hers flopping at the early stage of her career but ever since she became a name to reckon with, VIDESH – HEAVEN ON EARTH is clearly the biggest setback ever for her. She may have got critical acclaim coming her way but she would herself acknowledged the fact that this critical acclaim too came only from the critics, and not from ‘aam junta’ since there was hardly any audience in the theaters in the first week of it’s release in India.
The film is a huge disaster as it has not even managed to touch the 1 crore mark. Collections have been so poor and word of mouth (from those limited few who saw the film) such negative that VIDESH – HEAVEN ON EARTH barely survived a week at the box office. A boring pseudo intellectual film which tried to use the metaphor of a black cobra as an integral part of the narrative, this Deepa Mehta flick has little chances of finding an audience even on the DVD circuit.
Yet another week, three more films, three more flops, and the strike has begun at theaters. What would follow next is IPL as well as the election season. Bollywood coudn’t have gone through a worst time like this ever!
