Superstar Rajinikanth scripts box-office history

Rajinikanth's Jailer 2 has emerged as the highest-grossing Tamil film worldwide within two weeks of its release. Now, the big question is whether it can march towards the coveted 1,000-crore mark, a milestone no Tamil film has achieved so far.

JAILER 2 IS BREAKING RECORDS, AND THE TRADE IS BETTING ON MORE The film's record-breaking run has been driven by its performance across South and overseas. Sanjeev Kumar Bijli, executive director of PVR INOX Limited, tells us that "Rajinikanth's popularity, combined with the film's scale and overall audience connect" is driving the film's performance. "There are lots of repeat audiences, and demand is very high. Many older people who haven't watched a film in a theatre in years are coming to watch Jailer 2," shares Ankitha Prakash of Varadaraja Cinemas.

For Tirupur Subramaniam, president of the Tamil Nadu Theatre and Multiplex Owners Association, the film's success comes down to a formula that has worked for Rajinikanth over the years. "Similar to Rajini sir's old films, Jailer 2 also has comedy. Whenever his films have had well-executed comedy, they have done well.

Look at Annaamalai, Padayappa, Chandramukhi and Sivaji: The Boss. Nelson has followed that formula," he says.

KB Sriram, distributor and creative producer, is confident that the film is "set to be the highest- grosser in Tamil Nadu by crossing Leo". "No one had expected such huge figures. Jailer 2 has sold one crore tickets on an online ticket booking platform. Food & Beverage (F&B) sales have crossed around ₹250 crore in 11 days. Multiplexes will also continue playing the film till November end," he says.

Superstar takes over the SouthIn Kerala, Jailer 2 has emerged as the highest-grossing non-Malayalam film, ending Baahubali 2's nine- year reign. BR Jacob, president of the Kerala Film Chamber of Commerce, says, "It has generated record collections in Kerala in its first week. Usually, sequels don't do that well. So, there weren't that high expectations, but this film has exceeded them. People are also looking forward to Anirudh's music. Jailer 2 is getting maximum screens here, as there haven't been any other film to compete with it. Both the youth and family audiences are coming in."

Despite a limited release compared to its predecessor, Jailer 2 has been performing well in Karnataka, says K Manju, the film's statewide distributor and founder of K Manju Cinemas. "We acquired the distribution rights for 29 crore, with an additional expenditure of 1 crore. At the time of Jailer 2's release, the Kannada film Premada Oorali was already performing well across Karnataka, particularly in the A, B and C centres. On the advice of Rajinikanth sir and Shiva Rajkumar sir, we decided not to affect the Kannada film's successful run and restricted the release of Jailer 2 to 150 screens; for Jailer, we had secured 300 theatres. But despite the restricted release, the film has been performing well. Given the demand, I believe it will enjoy a successful run here for at least another three weeks," he says. The film has grossed ₹ 92.2 crore in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.

The ₹1,000-crore questionHowever, despite emerging as the highest-grossing Tamil film worldwide, Jailer 2's chances of entering the ₹1,000-crore club are far from certain, say industry insiders. The film didn't release in North Indian multiplex chains like PVR-INOX and Cinépolis owing to its makers' decision to go with a four-week OTT window. The multiplex chains in the Hindi belt strictly mandate that a film run for eight weeks in theatres before hitting OTT. Distributor Karthik Ravivarma believes the film could wrap up its run with a worldwide gross of ₹800-900 crore. "The chances of the film collecting €1,000 crore might be bleak because it didn't really have a release in North multiplexes," he says.

Producer and distributor Dhananjheyan says, "The Hindi- dubbed version was released only on single screens in the north. If it had been released in the multiplexes as well, the film would have easily made ₹1,000 crore. The OTT rights were already sold for a four-week window across all languages, including Hindi, before the film's release. The demand for an eight-week OTT window would have required the producers to renegotiate the deal."

He believes North Indian multiplexes, too, have suffered a loss because "they have lost a potential 150-crore turnover".