Box office: Baazaar has a disappointing opening weekend with Rs10.75 crore

Saif Ali Khan's latest film Baazaar, directed by Gauravv Chawla, could only bag Rs10.75 crore nett at the box office in the opening weekend, as reported by Boxofficeindia.com. The business-crime drama opened poorly with Rs2.75 crore nett on Friday (26 October), improving only marginally over the weekend with Rs3.75 crore nett on Saturday (27 October) and Rs4.25 crore nett on Sunday (28 October).  

Baazaar review: Saif Ali Khan's snarling stockbroker drives this parable on greed

Made at an estimated budget of Rs40 crore, Baazaar released in more than 2,000 screens across India.

The film has got mixed reviews with Saif Ali Khan being praised for his performance, but his film hasn’t delivered at the box office, yet again. Race 2 (2013) had pocketed Rs93.48 crore nett, but the film was made on a budget close to this amount.

The last hit from Khan was Cocktail (2012) that earned Rs73.48 crore nett. The film was made on a budget of Rs53 crore.

Even though Baazaar had a fairly decent buzz around it, the film is finding it tough to be a commercial success.

Trade analyst Atul Mohan couldn’t pinpoint a particular reason for Baazaar’s poor performance in the opening weekend, but felt that it got lost in the 'pre-Diwali' phase.

“It’s hard to give any reason why Baazaar hasn’t got going. The reviews have been fairly good, Saif Ali Khan has been appreciated for his performance. Usually, the pre-Diwali phase is a period where people get busy with household work, shopping. Also, they tend to save money for the annual big Diwali release. Besides, the preceding week’s release Badhaai Ho has done well and it continues to be the preferred choice of the audience,” said Mohan.

There were a host of other films that released along with Baazaar - Nargis Fakhri and Rajkummar Rao’s 5 Weddings, Neil Nitin Mukesh’s Dussehra, and Sharman Joshi’s Kaashi: In Search Of Ganga. Most of these films hardly got any screens and the only one that made some money is Kaashi. The crime-drama ended the opening weekend with Rs70 lakh.

The box office now eagerly awaits Aamir Khan’s Diwali release, Thugs Of Hindostan, to bring home some cheer.