Superstar Akshay Kumar’s film Samrat Prithviraj hasn’t performed up to the mark at the Indian box office as it mints only ₹44.40 Cr in 4 days. After an underwhelming start on day 1 (Friday) with collections of ₹10.70 Cr, the film saw a jump of around 17.75% and minted ₹12.60 Cr on Saturday.
Further, on Sunday, the film saw a jump of 27.77% vis-a-vis Saturday and minted ₹16.10 Cr, which took its weekend total to 39.40 Cr. Yet, this total was underwhelming considering a big-budget YRF film (according to Wikipedia, the budget is 300 Cr), starring a superstar like Akshay Kumar in the lead.
But the real disappointment and a shock for the trade was the film’s Monday numbers. This Dr Chandraprakash Dwivedi directorial saw a huge drop of around 69% on its fourth day vis-a-vis Sunday and 53.27% vis-a-vis Friday.
The film showed no sign of growth on Tuesday as collections were slightly lower than Monday. The film’s lifetime business (Net India) seems to be below ₹70 Cr rupees which makes it one of the biggest flops of not only Akshay but also Yash Raj Films.
But why did this lavishly mounted war drama made on one of the greatest kings of India, Prithviraj Chauhan, tank at the box office? Here are the five reasons:
1. Bad Casting
When the film’s trailer was released, it received mixed responses from people. The most common opinion was that Akshay Kumar was a misfit in this role. If you check the comments on the YouTube link of the trailer, you will see innumerable negative comments about Akshay’s casting in the film.
That’s where the film became unexciting for the audience. After watching the film, many people complained about the same.
2. Wrong Promotional Strategy
The first day numbers (10.70 Cr) are enough to tell us that people were not excited about the film. There wasn’t enough buzz. And we have to blame it on the wrong promotional strategy.
Instead of doing more interviews with digital media and attracting audiences with interesting content from the film (songs, teasers, dialogue promos, etc.), they focused more on showing the film to politicians by arranging special screenings. They did very limited interviews.
Were they expecting a miracle like Vivek Ranjan Agnihotri’s The Kashmir Files?
3. Uninteresting Screenplay
Except for the first 10 minutes, the interval block and the climax sequence, nothing really worked for most of the audiences and film critics. The screenplay written by Mr Dwivedi (who is also the director) failed to move the audience. The emotional scenes (death of Kaka Kanha played by Sanjay Dutt and Sanyogita played by Manushi Chillar) fell flat due to lacklustre execution.
Even at a mere 2 hours 15 minutes, the film seemed too long. And that’s the biggest failure of the screenplay, according to me.
4. Absence Of Hit Music And Clap-Worthy Dialogues
While the VFX, background music and sets of the film were some of the plus points, what again didn’t work for the film is its music and the dialogues. If we look at the other historical films in Bollywood like Jodha Akbar, Bajirao Mastani, Padmaavat, etc., apart from the engaging screenplay, what worked for them was the hit music and punchy dialogues.
Samrat Prithviraj missed exactly that. Today, when films like Pushpa, RRR and KGF Chapter 2 are breaking records at the box office, where the music and dialogues were the key ingredients, the simple (or, as they say, realistic) treatment given to this Akshay Kumar starrer didn’t excite the audience.
The director must have his own reasons for such treatment, but it can’t change the fact that it marred the film’s box office.
5. Overdose Of Historical Films For Maharashtra’s Audience
Mumbai circuit is considered the best performing circuit for Hindi films. And Samrat Prithviraj was very weak here.
In the last 5 months, the Marathi industry gave three historical films: Pawankhind, Sher Shivraj and Sarsenapati Hambirrao. Pawankhind was a big hit, while Sarsenapati Hambirrao is still running successfully in cinemas. In such a scenario, it seems the audience in Maharashtra, especially Marathi-speaking people, were not interested in watching one more historical film.