The North American box office witnessed strong activity with the arrival of “Kantara Chapter 1” last weekend.
Although films like Varun Dhawan and Janhvi Kapoor’s “Sunny Sanskari Ki Tulsi Kumari,” Dhanush’s “Idli Kadai” (released as Idli Kottu in Telugu), and the holdover movie “OG” were also in theaters, the major chunk of collections went to “Kantara 1.”
The Rishab Shetty and Rukmini Vasanth starrer grossed $2.41 million in its opening weekend — a massive opening for a Kannada film.
Interestingly, the Telugu version contributed a higher amount than the Kannada version, showing that Telugu Americans preferred this new release over the holdover “OG.”
However, “Kantara” has a long way to go to even reach break-even, given the high costs involved.
It is doubtful whether the film will touch the $4 million mark, while it reportedly needs around $7 million to turn profitable.
On the other hand, Pawan Kalyan’s “OG” added very little to its tally in the second weekend. The film is almost at the end of its run.
Despite director Sujeeth and music director Thaman touring various U.S. cities to boost collections during the second weekend, the numbers remained low.
The cumulative gross now stands at $5.76 million. The film, however, is a huge profit maker for the USA distributor.
Dhanush’s “Idli Kadai” performed poorly, grossing just $180K in five days. |
