Dunki, Shah Rukh Khan’s third film of the year, debuted in theaters on Thursday with much fanfare. The Rajkumar Hirani film’s first showing in India took place at Mumbai’s famed single-screen theater Gaiety Galaxy at 5:55 a.m., and the images from the theater went viral on the internet, giving the impression that it was a celebration. Nevertheless, the film did not receive as much attendance during the day.
According to industry tracker Sacnilk, Dunki is expected to gross approximately Rs 30 crore on Thursday, based on early estimates. The movie’s occupancy in the morning shows was 26.45%, while in the afternoon shows it was 21.77%. The total occupancy in Hindi for the film was approximately 24.11%. It should be noted that the SRK starrer has opened in theaters on a working weekday and may pick up steam over the upcoming Christmas weekend.
But the other big obstacle for Dunki is going to be Prashanth Neel’s Salaar, which opens in theaters on Friday. The movie is already a formidable rival to Dunki at the ticket booths; even before its premiere, it had made Rs 35.23 crore from the sale of 16,83,871 tickets.
Dunki will not have the same impact in South India as Salaar, according to film trade expert Sreedhar Pillai, who made this prediction prior to the film’s release:”Duki is an emotional, family-friendly movie that will not play on many screens and will only play in multiplexes because it does not have a Telugu or Tamil dubbing.”