Pawan kalyan starrer Ustaad Bhagat Singh was the film that shocked the film industry. The reasons are many.
The first one is despite coming in the hit combination of Pawan Kalyan–Harish Shankar after a long time after Gabbar Singh, the film generated no hype. Of course this Pawan Kalyan's film was coming after the super successful 'They Call Him OG', but still didn't catch up any hype or hoopla. And this was seen in the marketing as well as openings.
Especially in the USA, there was no buyer till the last hour and finally the producer himself released it on his risk. But the openings are very poor and shockingly low, in such a way that the theatre passes were enabled on the second day itself, which never happens for big films during the first weekend. Due to this, whatever be the gross collection, the share amount cuts to very marginally normal, which is almost nil. In a way, the USA sources say that the response of this film is way lower than that of Hari Hara Veera Mallu, the colossal disaster. This is regarded as the big star film that made the least premiere openings in recent years.
Even in the home front, the film was sold not at fancy prices in several areas, but at cut-throat nominal prices. Eventually the collections were not at all encouraging from day 1. The premiere tickets were kept at a moderate Rs 500, unlike Rs 1000 for 'They Call Him OG', but still the response was low with no full shows in many centers of Andhra Pradesh.
The shock factor is that Harish Shankar is a commercial director who shouldered the film since the beginning with enthusiastic promotions and brought some vibe for fans. But still fans didn't move to make all shows full for Pawan Kalyan like they did for OG.
On the other hand, even to escape stating that 'Dhurandhar The Revenge' dented the collections of UBS, it should be underlined that the Telugu version of 'Dhurandhar The Revenge' was delayed for two days to make the line clear for UBS. But still the fate didn't turn positive. This is another shock.
The bottom line that we have to understand is that Pawan Kalyan is an over-hyped hero and his marketability has come down drastically. His films bring openings only with directors who can give Gen Z appeal like in OG and with great music, but not with the past decade kind of films.
Pawan Kalyan's image itself cannot pull crowds anymore, but he should join with Gen Z directors who can present him very differently.
Majority distributors of UBS in the domestic market are saying that they would lose anywhere between 50–70% with this film.
But all said and done, Harish Shankar deserves all the praise. Despite knowing the fate of the film, he is still doing post-release publicity, shouldering everything on himself. That needs a lot of guts and conviction. He believed in what he delivered and fans are also respecting him for that.
As a director who worked on the lines of “work hard and promote hard,” he will stay strong in the industry. With this kind of approach, he would very soon bag another big film. But what should be underlined is that he should unlearn himself with regard to presentation style and come up with something that appeals to Gen Z style.
All the best, Harish! You are really fighting a lost battle like Iran against Israel and the USA, showing the strength of your conviction.
