Muthu Kumar never felt more desperate staying away from home. “Feeling homesick doesn’t mean missing home alone; homesickness has a deeper connotation. My home town is going gaga over thalaivar’s Kabali and here I am, sitting away from all the excitement and the worst part being not able to see the first day first show of my favourite hero’s magnum opus ,” rues the young Rajinikanth fan from Madurai, currently based in city.
Well before its release on Friday, most of the tickets for Rajinikanth-starrer Kabali are sold out in Krishna district.
Fans cannot wait to watch the actor entertain them with his trademark style. The unprecedented hype that the Tamil super star’s latest flick generated has taken into its fold even the most jaded souls. “I am not a Rajini fan but ever since I watched the teaser of the film, I have this longing to see him on the silver screen,” says Pujita Rajan, a housewife.
Many youngsters, obsessed with watching the first-day first-show, are turned away at the counters in theatres.
The stylish star of Tamil Nadu portrays in this film the role of a gangster trying to protect his family and business from his enemies. After acting in more than 150 films, predominantly in the Tamil cinema, Rajinikanth has earned a huge fan-following not just in Tamil Nadu but across the country.
“Movie buffs can enjoy Kabali on 59 screens across Krishna district. Multiplexes will screen five shows while single-screens will run four shows as usual. Tickets on all 59 screens have been sold out,” confirms a source from G3 Movies, distributor of the film.
When asked if the film distributor has any apprehension since Rajini’s recent films Linga and Kochadaiyaan had tanked leaving distributors in huge losses, he said there was no room for such fears since positive reviews were surfacing from abroad where the film had already been released.
Neither do reports of online leak perturb the distributor. “Take for instance Pavan Kalyan-starrer Attharintiki Daaredi . It was thought that piracy will play the spoilsport having an adverse impact on the collections in theatres. But the film went on to become one of the biggest [money] grossers,” says a source from the distributor’s office.
Refusing to comment on the expected collections on the first day of the show, he says it would fetch returns on the lines of any Pavan Kalyan, Mahesh Babu or Ju NTR-starrer.
For this kind of hype, the film has to be extraordinarily good. In Baahubali , more than anything else, people were eager to see the graphics but in Kabali , audience is waiting see Rajinikanth’s acting, says a trade pundit.
