Avengers: Endgame has absolutely demolished the Indian box-office. Within just a week of its release and on half the maximum possible screens nonetheless, Endgame has earned ₹310 crores (around $45 million) in India. That number, after taxes, comes own to a 260 crores nett ($37.6 million) but is still unlike anything ever witnessed for a Hollywood movie. In fact, it rivals and surpasses the numbers by local big-budget tentpoles by several crores and has passed the lifetime collections of Avengers: Infinity War in the country, which stood at about $41 million.
The movie opened to a thunderous response in India with packed screenings even at the oddest of hours. Movie theaters gradually increased showtimes when they realized the unprecedented demand for seeing the culmination of 11 years and 22 movies worth of storytelling among Indian audiences. The movie closest to the 260 crore earned by Endgame is the Hindi-language dub of Baahubali 2: The Conclusion which sits at 247 crore and which itself, was a local phenomenon. Among Bollywood movies, Salman Khan starrers Sultan (229 crores) and Tiger Zinda Hai (206 crores) are the only ones that have made over 200 crores in a week.
These numbers and comparisons certainly help put some perspective on Endgame‘s phenomenal box-office performance in India. That performance is even more impressive when taking screen count into account; where most tentpole are allotted 4,000+ screens, Endgame was running on around 2,000 screens. The involved marketing campaign by Marvel-Disney with the involvement of co-director Joe Russo, Indian music composer A. R. Rahman and Indian director A. R. Murugadoss certainly helped push the momentum, as did a surprise interaction with Robert Downey Jr. With no major movie in sight for the next week, it’ll be super-interesting to see just how much business can Avengers: Endgame do in the country, and if it can go for the coveted 500 crore slot that seems to have been out of reach for even many homegrown productions.
Avengers: Endgame is running across movie theaters in India. Check out our movie review and let us know what you thought of the movie in the comments below.
