Kangana Ranaut‘s long-awaited solo directorial, Emergency, finally hit cinemas this Friday after several delays. Despite opening with modest numbers, the film marked Kangana’s biggest box-office opening in the last five years, following the pandemic.
According to Sacnilk, Emergency earned Rs 2.35 crore on its opening day. When compared to Kangana’s previous solo releases, this opening stands out as the highest.
In comparison, Kangana’s 2023 aerial action film Tejas, directed by Sarvesh Mewara, had a modest Rs 1.25 crore opening, while her 2022 action film Dhaakad, directed by Razneesh Ghai, grossed Rs 1.20 crore on its opening day.
Another political biopic, Thalaivii (2021), directed by AL Vijay, which focused on the life of late Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa, had an opening of Rs 1.46 crore across its three language releases – Tamil, Telugu, and Hindi.
Kangana’s biggest opening before Emergency came in January 2020, prior to the pandemic, with the sports drama Panga directed by Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari, which earned Rs 2.70 crore.
On its opening day, Emergency saw an overall Hindi occupancy of 19.26%. The film had the highest audience attendance in Chennai, with a 25% occupancy, followed by Mumbai at 23.75%.
The movie saw the most audience engagement during its night shows, with night show occupancy at 36.25%. The morning shows saw only 5.98% of the audience, while afternoon shows had 13.95%, and evening shows experienced 20.86% occupancy.
Emergency is set against the backdrop of India’s Emergency period from 1975 to 1977, a time when civil rights and freedom of the press were severely restricted. The film also stars Shreyas Talpade, Milind Soman, Mahim Chaudhary, Anupam Kher, late actor Satish Kaushik, Vishak Nair and others, with a screenplay by Ritesh Shah.