Sachin Tendulkar's biopic rakes in Rs 8.6 Crores on Day 1
What’s the story?
Indian batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar’s biopic titled Sachin: A Billion Dreams raked in Rs 8.6 crores in box office collection from the opening day as his ardent fans and movie-goers alike flocked the cinemas to catch the story of their favourite cricketer on the big screen.
According to a report in Boxofficeindia.com, the Hindi version of the movie, written and directed by James Erskine, collected almost Rs 7 crore while the revenue from the Marathi, Telugu, English and Tamil versions moved it past the Rs 8.5 Cr mark.
The impressive box-office collection even led to remarks that Sachin: A Billion Dreams could well turn out to be Cricket’s Baahubali.
In case you didn’t know...
While Sachin Tendulkar has been conducting special screenings of the movie for a few celebrities and cricketers, including the members of the Indian cricket team who watched the movie before departing to England as they look to defend the ICC Champions Trophy they won in 2013, for close to a week, it was only on Friday, May 26, that the movie hit the screens for the general public.
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Released in the form of a docu-drama and narrated by the Master Blaster himself, the film has struck a chord with the general public who have been left enthralled catching the tale of arguably the world’s greatest ever cricketer through his own words.
The details
The movie details Sachin’s rise to international fame and beyond right from his early days as a young prankster. Unlike MS Dhoni’s biopic, which saw Sushant Singh Rajput donning the former Indian skipper’s role or Mary Kom’s biopic which saw Priyanka Chopra fit into the boxer’s role, Sachin’s biopic features the man himself tell it all from his own perspective lending a great sense of authenticity to the project.
Needless to say, it has been the most keenly anticipated sports movie of the year and undoubtedly of the biggest scale attempted on an Indian athlete. The numbers on the opening day just prove the level of expectations that were been placed on the movie, just like how Sachin used to shoulder the responsibility of the Indian side for much of his career as a cricketer.
It is heartening to see the response that has been generated by the movies which the makers of the movie as well as Sachin himself hope will inspire the youth to chase their dreams and follow their ambitions.
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What’s next
If the opening day collections are anything to go by, Sachin: A Billion Dreams could well go on to break some records at the box-office. Releasing the movie in five different languages seems to have done the trick with the revenue generated from the three regional languages as well as English proving to be no small feat.
Author’s take
The saying that Sachin Tendulkar rarely disappoints continues to hold good even after close to 4 years since he retired from the game as the box office collections on the opening day of his biopic’s release suggest.
While there have been suggestions from some quarters that the movie could have shed more light into some of Sachin’s more controversial moments as a cricketer, the fact remains that the public have responded warmly to the movie and the numbers are only set to grow in the coming days.