Shah Rukh Khan’s ‘Dunki’ Earns $25 Million

After a below-expectation opening on Thursday, Shah Rukh Khan’s new Hindi film Dunki closed the first extended weekend at a decent score of nearly $25 million global gross collections. In the weekend ending December 24, the film also ranked on the fourth slot in Comscore’s
SCOR
list of highest-grossing films across the globe with $22.4 million earnings. Directed and edited by Rajkumar Hirani, Dunki was the tenth highest-grossing films in that weekend in the US markets.

Dunki’s global gross figure for four-day extended weekend stood at $24.7 million while the film made $15.3 million in India. The first weekend figures are rather disappointing for a Khan film which also marks his first collaboration with director-writer Rajkumar Hirani. However, the film stood its ground in front of the big Telugu release that came out just a day later. Featuring Prabhas (of Bahubali fame), the film released in four dubbed versions including Hindi, getting an edge ahead of the Hindi movie.

Dunki made an opening nett collection of $3.4 million nett collections in India while the global gross score for day one stood at $6.9 million. Khan registered his lowest opening for the year 2023, and his fourth-highest-opener ever with Dunki. The Bollywood star’s Jawan was the top opening Hindi film of the year with an opening score of $15.5 million. His first release this year, Pathaan, opened with a worldwide gross score of $13 million. The other Khan film ahead of Dunki is Chennai Express (apart from Jawan and Pathaan).

On the list of top opening Hindi films of 2023, Dunki is the ninth one. Khan’s previous films Jawan and Pathaan made $7.3 million and $6.6 million opening collections, respectively, in India. Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s Animal made an opening collection of $6.1 million in the country and Salman Khan’s Tiger 3 opened with $4.9 million. Sunny Deol’s comeback, Gadar 2, registered an opening collection of $4.6 million. Prabhas-starrer Adipurush made $3.8 million while Brahmastra Part One Shiva made $3.6 million.

The collections of Dunki took slight dip on the second day of the release as it was also a working day. The film also faced competition from the Telugu film Salaar: Part 1 – Ceasefire, which released in five Indian languages including the original Telugu version and a dubbed Hindi.

The total nett collections of the film in India after two days at the ticket windows fell short of $6 million. The global gross for Dunki stood at $12.3 million at the end of day two, Friday. Just days before the release of Dunki, reports claimed that major cinema chains were favoring the Bollywood film while the makers of Salaar The Ceasefire were being treated differently. However, one of the biggest cinema chain in India, PVR-INOX, denied the reports in a press statement before Dunki’s release.

Dunki is the story of a group of Indians aspiring to migrate to England for a better life soon after their country gained Independence from the British rule. Khan plays a former soldier in the group of friends which comprises of a young girl hoping to become the ‘son’ for her family (Taapsee Pannu), an ardent lover (Vicky Kaushal) in need to help his lady love, and two young boys who hope to save their family from financial struggles (Vikram Kochhar and Anil Grover). Boman Irani essays the role of a tutor. Gurpreet Ghuggi and Rohitashv Gaur are also seen in interesting cameos in the film. Director Hirani co-wrote the film with Abhijaat Joshi and Kanika Dhillon.