BAAHUBALI - THE BEGINNING Breaks Just About Every Box Office Record For Indian Films

I'm typically not one to dote on box office numbers, in fact, I find the whole practice rather off-putting. While I recognize that any film industry is a combination of art and commerce, uniformly leaning far more toward the sign of commerce, I prefer to appreciate films for what they are, rather than what they earn. However, in this case I'll make an exception because this weekend SS Rajamouli's Baahubali - The Beginning destroyed every box office record for Indian films around the world, and that is remarkable for a number of reasons.

First of all, let's hit some of the numbers. Baahubali - The Beginning brought in $7.8 million inside of India on its first day of release. This breaks the record previously held by Shah Rukh Khan's Happy New Year by nearly $1 million. Through the weekend Baahubali brought in $20.4 million in India alone, which also marks the highest opening weekend of all time. The second largest market in the world for Indian films is the U.S., and Baahubali also broke records here with a $1.35 million dollar opening day, and a $4.4 million opening weekend making it the biggest opener for any Indian film in U.S. history while sitting pretty at #9 on the box office rankings.

Now, why is this significant? Well, the Indian film circuit in the U.S. is something of a shadow film economy. These films are shown in different parts of the country with significant Indian and South Asian populations, but often in second run or dedicated cinemas. The distribution model runs parallel to the Hollywood distribution system, but works very differently. With Hindi language films, there is a very well established system that has been put into place by the Indian studios who distribute on their own with corporate presences in the U.S. This allows them to be consistent in their marketing and pricing. Indian regional films are not as standardized.

Baahubali - The Beginning is a Telugu language film, which is different from Bollywood. These films are most frequently acquired for release in the U.S. by a central distributor, of which there are several, who then parcels out local rights to several different exhibitors who have territorial claims to each film. Most often the exhibitors will work out deals with local cinemas to rent out auditoriums sitting next to Hollywood films and collect much of the ticket sales themselves. This means that ticket pricing is usually not at the discretion of the theater, but at the discretion of the exhibitor, which leads to tickets being priced in what western audiences might not see as a confusing matrix of options.

For example, because of the number of time zones between the U.S. and India, Baahubali - The Beginning (and most South Indian blockbusters) will open on the Thursday prior to the advertised opening day. By Thursday evening here in Dallas, it's already well into Friday in India, so we are seeing films simultaneously with their premieres back in the homeland. These shows are called, aptly enough, "premiere shows" and are treated as premium events. The tickets for Baahubali's Thursday premiere shows were set at $25, which seems ludicrous, but several days before the first screening, the film had sold out its first couple of days in most major markets. On Friday, the film's official opening day, tickets were down to $20 and that is where they sit today, holding firm at that price at least until the end of the week.

Back in India the pricing schedule faces similar standardization issues. Prices for opening night shows were also significantly higher than any other film, and like here, they were sold out for days in advance, meaning that the concern of pricing was secondary to the concern of bragging rights to see the film in the cinema first. The demand exceeds the supply, even though this is among the widest releases ever in India with over 4000 screens secured for the first week, which creates a secondary black market for tickets that isn't counted among the official numbers.

The ticket pricing, which is unusual by western standards, does put those exceptional numbers into a different perspective. However, the fact that a film in Telugu can overpower the box office numbers of a Bollywood blockbuster starring the world's biggest movie star, Shah Rukh Khan, is pretty incredible no matter how you slice it. Baahubali - The Beginning has made more money faster than any Indian film ever, crossing the coveted "100 crore" (~$16 million) mark faster than any other film. While the film has a long way to go to catch up to current all-time box office champ PK ($120 million worldwide, $10 million U.S.), it's certainly making a play at those numbers.