Box office collections: Bhediya and Drishyam 2 bring in over Rs 15 crore on Friday

Kriti Sanon and Varun Dhawan in 'Bhediya', which released in theatres on November 25, 2022.

Last Friday, Drishyam 2 had opened quite well and brought in Rs 15.38 crore at the box office. This Friday was pretty much the same, with Rs 15.35 crore coming in between the new release Bhediya and last week's Drishyam 2. While the Varun Dhawan-Kriti Sanon starrer Bhediya brought in Rs 7.48 crore, Drishyam 2 held on quite solidly to accumulate Rs 7.87 crore on its second Friday.

For the exhibition circle, this is good news indeed, as it's been a while since there have been back-to-back releases with good money coming in. Otherwise there were barren periods of weeks upon weeks when nothing was really happening at the box office and even a single day of Rs 10 crore was not coming in. Leave aside Fridays, things were not improving on Sundays either, with one disaster after another. In that aspect, at least there are brisk ticket sales now, and when it comes to theatre owners, it doesn't matter whether it happens through one or multiple films.

Bhediya saw Varun Dhawan and Kriti Sanon coming together. The Dinesh Vijan and Amar Kaushik film was expected to repeat the success of Stree; the Rajkummar Rao and Shraddha Kapoor starrer had opened to Rs 6.82 crore back in 2018 and Bhediya was being pitched as a Rs 10 crore opener at least. However, with Drishyam 2 still going strong, the audiences got divided.

The good news for Bhediya is that the word of mouth is positive, especially amongst youth and kids, and that should allow for good growth coming in today as well as tomorrow. On its release Stree had seen phenomenal growth over the weekend, which resulted in Rs 32.26 crore being collected. Now that's the number which Bhediya would be chasing as well, and then hope that the momentum stays well into the weekdays as well.

Meanwhile, Drishyam 2 already has momentum on its side and that's what helped it grow from Rs 15.38 crore on its opening day to Rs 104.66 crores by the close of first week. On its second Friday, the film collected Rs 7.87 crores - slightly lower than Thursday's Rs 8.62 crore. Positive word of mouth is also bringing in more footfalls for this film.

Advance booking figures for the rest of the weekend suggest Drishyam 2 could make Rs 33-35 crore in its second weekend - a sum which has hardly come for any films in 2022 during the first weekend and here, the Abhishek Pathak directed suspense drama would achieve that in the second weekend. At this rate, Drishyam 2 may enter the 200 Crore Club by the end of its run in theatres.

As for Uunchai, it will fold up around the Rs 30 crore mark. After its second week, the film has collected Rs 26.42 crore and now is hardly playing at a few screens and shows. It has had to battle a lot of competition, with Drishyam 2 and now Bhediya coming in. This could be director Sooraj Barjatya's lowest grossing film in theatres as even his Vivah collected Rs 31.56 crore and that too back in 2006!

*Estimates. Final numbers awaited

Note: All collections as per production and distribution sources