Box Office Report: Kangana Ranaut's Manikarnika Off to a Decent Start, Nawazuddin Siddiqui's Thackeray Witnesses Low Occupancy

Two big films have hit the theatres today and both of them are biographies - Kangana Ranaut's Manikarnika: The Queen of Jhansi and Nawazuddin Siddiqui's Thackeray. While Kangana starrer created good buzz before the release, Nawazuddin's film managed to generate curiosity mostly in Maharashtra for obvious reasons. As for the screen count, Manikarnika has released on a wider scale with 3000 screens in India and 700 overseas. Plus, the period war drama co-directed by Kangana has released in over 50 countries which is quite impressive considering its a heroine-centric film. Manikarnika Movie Review: Kangana Ranaut’s Dominant Show Gives an Energetic Appeal to This Faltering Historical Drama.

And therefore the trade pundits are expecting that Manikarnika will open better than Thackeray overall. Well, going by the early reports, it seems that Kangana's film has indeed fared better in the morning shows than Nawazuddin starrer.

As per BoxOfficeIndia.com, Manikarnika witnessed around 15 to 20 % occupancy in the morning whereas Thackeray opened to just 10 % occupancy. The report further pointed out, "Manikarnika - The Queen Of Jhansi had an ordinary opening of 15-20% when it should have opened better considering the scale of the film. The problem is mass markets as UP, MP, Rajasthan etc should have had better collections. Maybe as the face value is limited to Kangana Ranaut who is not a big star has kept the audience away initially."

"The opening will be okay if we look at other heroine driven films but it's a tough task to reach the biggest which was Veere Di Wedding featuring Kareena Kapoor. The hope will be the evening push as its a big national holiday. The film is the biggest budget film ever which has a heroine as the only face so there will have to be a huge jump over the weekend for the film." Thackeray Movie Review: Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s Power-Packed Portrayal Works in Favour of This Idol Worship.

Coming to Thackeray, the report said that the film did far better in Maharashtra during the morning shows and that's where the major chunk of the collection will come from for the political drama. Also, Thackeray may not perform well across India but the film certainly has better chances of doing good business in Maharashtra and surrounding areas.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jan 25, 2019 04:33 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).