A low-scoring weekend for Bollywood

This week saw four releases – Ek Paheli Leela, Dharam Sankat Mein, Broken Horses and Barefoot to Goa. But of these, only two films managed substantial collections over the weekend, namely Sunny Leone starrer Ek Paheli Leela and the religious satire Dharam Sankat Mein.

Ek Paheli Leela opened to poor numbers on Friday and did not grow in the evening due to poor reviews and bad word of mouth. The film closed its first day at Rs. 5.30 crore. Saturday was no better as the film dropped by 15% in occupancies, collecting Rs. 5 crore.

The film struggled to show any kind of growth on its third day and closed collections on Sunday with Rs. 5.35 crore.

Having done evenly in both mass centers and metropolitans, Ek Paheli Leela’s collections so far amount to Rs. 15.65 crore. It is highly unlikely that the collections will grow during the week and the film may just gross Rs. 25 crore lifetime at its very best.

Dharam Sankat Mein fared far worse in comparison. Opening to meagre numbers, the film closed its first day at Rs. 1.30 crore. The film garnered average reviews but grew only by 30%, bringing in Rs. 1.70 crore on Saturday. The third day was slightly better as the film grew a little more but the growth was not substantial and the film closed collections on Sunday with Rs. 2.05 crore.

Over the course of three days, Dharam Sankat Mein has notched a total of Rs. 5.05 crore at the box office and the film is not expected to hit double-digit figures during its first week unless a massive upswing takes place.

Jacqueline’s family time

The sexy Jaqueline Fernandes recently took a small break from her busy schedule. It seems she had a blast in Bahrain as she visited family and friends there. The actress will be next seen in Dharma Production's Brothers starring Sidharth Malhotra, Akshay Kumar and Jackie Shroff. The film will be directed by Karan Malhotra.

Tabu turns singer

When Manoj Bajpayee and Neeraj Pandey were scouting for a singer for their next film, Manoj came up with an idea. He suggested that his longtime friend and actress, Tabu, should lend her voice to the song. Everyone loved the idea and Tabu being a close buddy, readily agreed to help and recorded a melodious number for the film.

Priyanka to work with Zoya again

After working with Zoya Akhtar in her multi-starrer Dil Dhadakne Do, Priyanka Chopra is all set to work with the director in her next. A source close to the two tells us that Zoya and PC bonded rather well during the making of DDD, which is why Zoya offered Priyanka her next film. And because the actress love’s the director’s sensibilities, she readily agreed to be a part of the project. Zoya’s next is touted to be a women-centric film.

Kangana, Queen, Haider win big at the National Awards

Two months back, the Black Lady honoured Kangana Ranaut’s performance in Queen as the Best Actress. Today, the actress has won yet another prestigious honour for her stellar performance. She has bagged her second National Award in the Best Actress category. Her first National Award was for Fashion (Best Actress in a Supporting Role).

Queen has also won the Best Hindi Feature Film this year. Vishal Bhardwaj’s Haider too won big. The film won 5 National Awards including Best Music, Best Playback Singer (Male), Best Dialogue, Best Costume Designer and Best Choreography. The Priyanka Chopra-starrer Mary Kom was named the Best Popular Film providing wholesome entertainment. 

This is not the first time that a Filmfare Award winner goes ahead to win the National recognition. In the past, Priyanka Chopra for Fashion, Vidya Balan for The Dirty Picture, Rishi Kapoor for Do Dooni Chaar, Irrfan Khan for Paan Singh Tomar and Rajkummar Rao for Shahid went ahead to win the National Award after winning the Black Lady.