Jio Studios and B62 Studios’ Durandal: The Revenge had an unprecedented opening weekend, grossing 761 million rupees ($82.4 million) worldwide, setting a new standard for Hindi films around the world.
Aditya Dhar’s spy action sequel, which was released on March 19, achieved the highest opening weekend gross ever for a Hindi film worldwide, driven by unprecedented advance bookings and sold-out screenings across all circuits. Arjun’s Telugu film ‘Pushpa 2: The Rules’ holds the record for an overall weekend opening for an Indian film, including the Hindi-dubbed version, with $92.5 million, while ‘Dhulandar: The Revenge’ set a benchmark for Hindi films with an overseas opening weekend gross of $22.8 million.
Across a four-day extended opening, including Wednesday’s paid screenings in North America, the film grossed $59.5 million in India and $22.8 million internationally over its opening weekend.
The film set multiple all-time records in India, including the highest advance sales of any movie in India, the highest preview box office gross of all time, the fastest local movie sales of INR 300 million ($31.9 million), and most tickets sold on the first Saturday. BookMyShow reported that 109,170 tickets were sold per hour, the highest sales rate in the platform’s history.
Internationally, the sequel had the highest opening day gross for an Indian film not including the Gulf region, the highest grossing for a single Indian film on Saturday with $6.2 million, and was ranked second on ComScore across major markets, as well as number one on the secondary market. The film had the widest international release for a Hindi film, with around 2,200 theaters and 3,000 screens outside the Gulf region.
In North America, Dhurandhar: The Revenge raked in $10 million over the weekend and $14 million in a five-day extended release, setting a new standard for Hindi releases. The film surpassed the previous Bollywood record held by Shah Rukh Khan’s Pattern in 2023, which grossed $6.9 million in three days of release and $9.5 million in five days. The debut film fell just short of the all-time opening record for an Indian film, held by SS Rajamouli’s Baahubali 2: The Final Chapter, which grossed $10.4 million domestically in 2017.
In the UK, Dhurandhar: The Revenge ranked second overall at the box office with an estimated opening weekend gross of $2.8 million (£2.2 million), emerging as one of the best-performing Indian titles on the market in recent years.
The sequel also expanded to non-traditional territories for Bollywood, including Uruguay, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Romania, Chile, Mexico and Cyprus.
In North America, the film played on 185 screens during the re-release of the first film, and the sequel premiered in the United States and Canada on Wednesday, March 18th. This advancement primarily utilizes premium large-format auditoriums with extra-large screens, Dolby Atmos audio, enhanced projection, and premium seating. The midweek premiere was sold out in many locations.
The overseas box office gross for this weekend was $22.7 million over four days, including Wednesday’s U.S.-Canada previews, with daily sales of $5.5 million on Thursday, $4.9 million on Friday, $6.2 million on Saturday, and $6.0 million on Sunday.
Ranveer Singh will be back in a dual avatar, played by R Madhavan as Ajay Sanyal, Arjun Rampal as ISI Major Iqbal, Sanjay Dutt and Sara Arjun as SP Chaudhary Aslam.
The film, written, directed and produced by Aditya Dhar and also produced by Jyoti Deshpande and Lokesh Dhar, was released in Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada and Malayalam to coincide with pre-Eid Gudi Padwa and Ugadi celebrations.
This performance follows the original ‘Dhulandar’ which emerged as the biggest Hindi film in the world. Jio Studios brought the first film back to theaters on March 12-13 in 500 screens around the world in a rare international re-release ahead of the sequel’s release.
