Armed with a superb start, ‘Dostana’ was expected to have a meltdown effect from Monday onwards, but the weekdays have been in the 45% to 60% range at most plexes, which is great. The youth has taken to the film in a big way, that's the writing on the wall.

Of course, ‘Dostana’ is a non-performer at most single screens, except those patronised by elite. So what? That's not new! Hasn't that been the trend for all Karan Johar movies? Weren't ‘Kal Ho Naa Ho’ and ‘Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna’ non-performers at single screens? Why, even ‘Kuch Kuch Hota Hai’, considered a classic by many, besides being a Blockbuster, didn't work in Bihar.

That's what I like about Karan Johar. He's got the fundas right, he knows his target audience well. In any case, in today's times, 70% of our revenues are generated from plexes in India and Overseas. In India, ‘Dostana’ is the flavour of the season. In Overseas, it's one of the biggest draws of the year [as pointed out by this writer in the review of ‘Dostana’ last week].

If the film holds well in its second weekend - I'm sure, the numbers will be strong – ‘Dostana’ would safely recover the high price that's attached to it.

The target audience of ‘Dasvidaniya’ was the same as ‘Dostana’ - multiplex junta and I strongly feel that ‘Dasvidaniya’ got sidelined for this reason. With the youth/multplex crowd tilting towards ‘Dostana’, ‘Dasvidaniya’, expectedly, had a lukewarm start at the box-office [10 per cent; at places, 5 per cent to 7 per cent]. But the film gathered steam on Saturday and Sunday as the word of mouth has been extremely positive for this Vinay Pathak starrer. Favourable reviews in the media have also helped. Of course, the numbers haven't shown a big jump, but there has been an escalation for sure.

... contd.