This Eid can safely be called as “Eid of The Decade” for Pakistan film Industry. Not only Reema and Syed Faisal Bukhari were largely appreciated for their national language mega films, but unlike previous times; regional movies on this Eid were also applauded by their respective markets.
Love Mein Ghum by Reema Khan, Jugni by Syed Noor and Syed Faisal Bukhari’s action packed Bhai Log were amongst the top releases of Eid-ul-Fitr this year. Actor Arbaz Khan’s self directed Pushto film Baazigar also managed to pull a decent crowd in KPKH province, while other regional films failed to impress.
Although people had already made speculations about the Box office fate of three of these Lollywood Eid treats, but post release reports are always fun and interesting. So lets check out how people actually responded to these revival efforts for Pakistani cinema by some of the real patriots of this industry.
If you found that last sentence of previous paragraph a bit extra fervid, then just Relax! Because we were actually connecting that sentence with film Bhai Log that has been tagged same since it is released.
Bhai Log was one of the most anticipated movies of this year, and as expected; the movie managed to pull a huge crowd toward cinemas, the best part is that it’s still running quite successfully all over Pakistan, leading the other two Eid releases of industry. One major reason behind this success could be film’s ‘Action’ genre. We already have a established fact here that all over world action films account for a very huge market and just recently we saw a bumper success of Bollywood action film Singham on subcontinental Box office.
Despite getting mostly positive reviews and doing a huge business of more than a crore before its first release week, many are calling it to have an ‘Extra Patriotic’ feel. People are of the view that Patriotism was really exaggerated and story would have scored quite well without it. Music of the film has also failed to impress while action sequences, direction, over all acting and quality of the movie is appreciated most. All in all, it could be called as one fine effort by Syed Faisal Bukahri and now all eyes are on his next film project with quite a same genre named Saltanat.
Love Mein Ghum with its romantic-drama touch also attracted a huge crowd and received mostly mixed to positive reviews. Its interesting to mention here that according Galaxy Lollywood polls; LMG had the public approval ratio of almost 93% before its release while Bhai Log was standing far behind LMG with only 75% pre-release approval ratio. But quite opposite to which, even after crossing the business mark of one crore before its first release week, LMG is surprisingly said to be standing behind Bhai Log and facing a tough competition from Syed Noor’s Punjabi flick Jugni.
Although acting has been appreciated a lot in the movie, but people generally seems to be unhappy with the character space given to legendry Nadeem Baig and Indian comedy king Johnny Lever, and both are termed to be waisted in the movie. Besides this, as per public reviews and inside reports received by Galaxy Lollywood; Reema’s self-portraying factor in the film has also been criticized by industry insiders and general public.
Apart from all this, shooting locations, story, production quality and specifically the acting and return of Jia Ali in films have received some encouraging remarks.
Its very much relevant to mention here that as per cinematic facts and figures, Love Mein Ghum is noticed to be more popular towards the urban side of the country than the rural one and specially at multiplexes and the potential audience of the film has proved to be mostly families. Where as Bhai Log on the other hand has managed to target mostly the young audience and that too largely at single screen cinemas.
Besides two of them, another movie that has proved to be quite a crowd puller is Syed Noor’s Punjabi flick Jugni. Not only the cast value and past score of Syed Noor at Punjabi cinema is proving to be helpful in attracting people at large numbers toward cinemas, but the music of the movie has also made quite a mark in its target market.
As Galaxy Lollywood wasn’t really following the film because of the language policy, we would like not to comment on the public reaction it has received so far. But one thing that has been confirmed by our sources is that movie has not only crossed the mark of one crore at Box office but is also giving a tough competition to Reema Khan’s Love Mein Ghum.
Galaxy Lollywood congratulates the film-makers for the tremendous success their films have received so far and wish best of luck for the future of the movies. We sincerely believe that these films will not only be restricted to Pakistan but will also be hopefully showcased in international market.
thanks for sharing
Hey GalaxyLollywood,
Thanks for this review and the market update. It’s very encouraging to see these movies enjoying success, as this will inspire many more producers to invest in movies. The great thing is that though far from perfect, none of the three movies are following the old formula and have a fresh feel to them, as the reviews suggest. I am only concerned about the box office figures. Where do you get these numbers from? Is there any website or film trade forum which publishes the amounts grossed by all the films released? I know there are many such sites about Bollywood box office, but haven’t seen any for Lollywood, which is very much understandable, as the industry has only started to emerge from a long period of gloom. So how does one know the money made by each film?
Thanks,
Shueyb
Shueb, Basically these are the estimated figures that we have extracted from different reports we receive on daily basis from our individual inside sources. People, mainly having industry roots, are usually the biggest and one of the most authentic sources of Galaxy Lollywood. We gather these informations and calculate an average sum, this avg sum is something that you can see in this article too. This activity is mostly done on weekly basis and thus we try to keep record of the weekly performance of each film.
As you rightly said, there isn’t any particular website for collecting such reports and keeping an eye on the box office performance of Pakistani films, thus we have to do this activity all by ourselves. However sometimes, TV and media reports help us greatly in this regard.
Thanks
Admin Aayan
Love Mein Ghum is a great film. Bhai Log is fine too. That said, I am afraid it is more of a “Eid of a Decade” for Bodyguard in Pakistani cinemas as the cinemas seem to be playing them non-stop at the expense of the local films. It would have been better if the release of Bodyguard had been delayed a week or two in Pakistan. Unfortunately, there is no dearth of self-loathing Pakistanis who turn down their noses at Pakistani movies all the while shamelessly following even who is dating whom or which star is celebrating his/her birthday party across the border.
I am especially concerned about Love Mein Ghum. It took Reema several years to come up with the final version of the film and apparently it is the most expensive Pakistani film ever made! Indian singers were roped in and no stone was unturned to make it a hit. If LMG still fails to attract audiences and recoup investment then who, with the possible exception of Shoaib Mansoor, will dare make decent movies in Pakistan? Yes, we will continue to see a few Punjabi or Pashto movies here and there, catering at most to niche audiences, but what about nice feel good movies like LMG. I am sure a lot of other directors and priducers will be keenly following how LMG fares in the box office (and whether the multiplexes and newer cinemas continue to show it for some time or dicontinue it for Bodyguard or some other Bolly movie). If LMG fails, then it does not bode well for *big-budget decent Urdu films* at all.
I am a student of marketing and i think that the real cause of the failing of the pakistani films is less of advertising but all three films are perfect and hit
I am also marketing student and i am 100% agree with amir waqas..well we have a good example of BOL film huge marketing to make it successful easily…
Galaxy lollywood, can you please ask your contacts from the industry insiders, who are in the knowhow, about how did Love mein ghum fare at the box office? Seems like it flopped big time because most cinemas like DHA, Sozo etc are showing MBKD and Bodyuard multiple times a day and are no longer screening it even though hardly 10 days have passed since it was released. Too bad because the movie by all accounts was quite good.
Just read a news on ‘The daily Express’ that majority of the cinemas have stopped the screening of LMG and ‘Bhai Log’ even though their shows were housefull, just to screen new flicks from Bollywood. I really felt bad after knowing this and it shows the thinking and attitude of us as a nation. Wer are not supporting our own people and our own industry….it’s really pathetic! Just see what happened to our hit movie ‘Bol’ in india, it was realeased on Eid there and is badly flopped even though the critics really had very good and encouraging comments about it! Why???there was nothing worng with the movie its just because Indian people supported their own movies and their own people. Look at us! We have made ‘Bodyguard’ a success in Pakistan, though I was wishing it to be a flop as there were two exceptionally good quality movies ‘Bhai Log’ and ‘Love mein ghum’ been screened at the same time as ‘Bodyguard’.
May we love and support our own people and stop dying for imported stuff!
Reviews?
On second thought, no need! Cinepax removed LMG and now I doubt if any cinema is playing it. Bhai Log disappeared after 3 days or so I think. No one gave two hoots to local movies, not even PAF cinema. Shame.