Baby John starring Varun Dhawan released on Christmas Day, December 25. The film presented by Atlee and directed by Kalees, was being seen as a mass action entertainer that will end the year at the films with a bang. However, the box office collection has been concerning. On day 1, Baby John collected Rs 10.75 crore at the box office and on the second day, a regular working day, it made just Rs 4.5 crore, taking the film's nett domestic total to Rs 15.25 crore.
The film was released at a time when earlier released films like Pushpa 2: The Rule and Mufasa: The Lion King are also playing in the theatres. They made more money than the Varun Dhawan starrer. Pushpa 2 collected Rs 9.6 crore (Rs 7.25 crore in Hindi) while Mufasa raked in Rs 7 crore on Thursday. With such dismal performance on day 2, the film is expected to do low numbers on day 3, Friday as well since it is also a working day. But now all eyes are on the weekend collection. Trade analyst Sumit Kadel feels that the numbers will be crucial on Saturday and Sunday. "With such a sharp fall (60% from day 1 to day 2), it's do or die time. Baby John needs huge growth on Saturday and Sunday to stand any chance of survival," he feels.
Rohit Jaiswal, another trade analyst, had predicted the lifetime business of Baby John to be between Rs 80 crore - 100 crore, before its release. But now with the numbers on day 1 and day 2, he feels, "Baby John has to take miraculous growth on Saturday and Sunday or else wrap up under Rs 60 crore as lifetime."
The film is a remake of the Thalapathy Vijay-starrer Theri. Analysing why Baby John failed to impress the audience, Rohit observes, "Remakes will work but you will have to show it in a different way. Copy pasting will not work. A south actor fighting in a Lungi will be appreciated but a hindi film hero doing the same will not be tolerated. So stay like Bollywood." This he feels is because the Hindi film audience have accepted the South movies and actors wholeheartedly and they are watching original/dubbed versions like never before.
Industry is also abuzz with hush-hush discussions that Varun's lack of originality and experimenting with a genre away from his forte has led to such dismal performance. There is also talk that not promoting the film well enough or in an impactful manner, has led to the disinterest amongst the audience, who have many other options of entertainment (in theatres, on OTT and otherwise) this festive season.
Baby John is reportedly made on a budget of Rs 180 crore and boasts of a cameo from Salman Khan. It also stars Keerthy Suresh, Wamiqa Gabbi, Rajpal Yadav and Jackie Shroff in pivotal roles.
