Box office: Love Aaj Kal holds on with Rs11.75 crore opening on Valentine’s Day

Imtiaz Ali’s Love Aaj Kal (2020) managed to get a good opening on Valentine’s Day with a collection of Rs11.75 crore nett, according to numbers on BoxOfficeIndia.com.

This is the best opening of Kartik Aaryan’s career so far. His previous release, Pati Patni Aur Woh (2019), earned a little over Rs8 crore nett on its opening Friday.

The festival of love probably gave Love Aaj Kal a boost of around 40%, but the collection should have been more with Imtiaz Ali directing stars Kartik Aaryan and Sara Ali Khan.

Love Aaj Kal, which is made on a budget of Rs50 crore, according to trade sources, needs a good opening weekend as well.

The film has done well in the North but hasn’t performed as it should have in the metros of Mumbai, Pune and Bangalore. The 2020 film has outpaced Ali’s Love Aaj Kal (2009), which opened with Rs8.02 crore nett, but it needs to do well on the weekend despite mostly poor reviews by critics.

Last week’s release, Malang (2020), added Rs2.25 crore nett on its second Friday, taking its total collection to Rs40.25 crore nett, according to figures at BoxOfficeIndia.com. It does face competition from Love Aaj Kal, but the film’s steady numbers suggest it may have a decent second weekend.

Meanwhile, Ajay Devgn’s Tanhaji: The Unsung Warrior (2020) earned Rs60 lakh nett on its sixth Friday, moving the film’s total domestic collection to over Rs260 crore nett. It is still running strong in Maharashtra and looks good to reach the Rs265 crore mark.