Manikarnika: The Queen of Jhansi starred and directed by Kangana Ranaut has been released on the silver screen. It has a received a good opening collection and occupancy on its 1st Friday at the box office. Even before its release, the movie has been through its fair share of controversies and built buzz around it. Made of a huge budget, it will be interesting to see how it fares in terms of business. (check: Thackeray 1st day collection.)
A special screening was held in Rashtrapati Bhawan a day before its release. It was attended by many celebrities including Indian President Ram Nath Kovind, BJP veteran Lal Krishna Advani, actress Kangana, director Prasoon Joshni, among others. After the screening, President honored Kangana. (Check: Manikarnika review.)
It is the second film based on nationalism on the occasion of this Republic Day. The first one was Uri: The Surgical Strike that is also based on the real incident happened in 2016. The makers and trade analysts are hopeful that the film will be able to properly make use of the holidays.
Made on a massive budget of Rs 125 cr, Manikarnika has got attention for its magnificence. Besides Kangana, the film stars Ankita Lokhande, Suresh Oberoi, Danny, Zeeshan Aayub, Jeeshu Sengupta in important roles.
Opening Collection – Rs 8.5 cr
Before its release, it underwent lots of controversies. Earlier, Krish (Jagarlamudi Radhakrishna) was directing the film, but he left in the middle of it due to the same reason. Then, Kangana got to helm the movie and became the accident director. It is her flick as a director. The film received a number of threats from the Karni Sena. The same Karni Sena created a lot of problem for Padmaavat last year.
Manikarnika has taken a good start on Friday as far as the Morning occupancy is concerned. As the day progresses, it should witness increment in collections. The occupancy will multiply in the evening as tomorrow is a holiday owing to the fact that it is the Republic Day of India. It has received an average of 20% occupancy in the morning shows. The number is decent today being a normal working day.
Manikarnika’s collection will be affected to some extent due to the fact that Thackeray is releasing and Uri is still faring well.
As per the expectations, Manikarnika should earn somewhere around Rs 12 cr on its opening day at the box office. It is the second biopic release of the week. Thackeray based on the life of Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray has also been released at the same time and it stars Nawazuddin Siddiqui in the lead role. It is going to be a big clash.
