September 30, this coming Friday, will be a big day for Tamil cinema. There is excellent hype around Ponniyin Selvan which is Mani Ratnam’s biggest magnum opus to date, and cinema lovers across the world are waiting to experience it.
Mani Ratnam’s brand value, A R Rahman’s music, and a dream star cast have ensured that the film will take a flyer in the Tamil version.
Already, the pre-sales across the world have been going well for the Tamil version and if the film gets good word-of-mouth, then things look good for Tamil cinema.
The industry is buoyant with the success of Kamal Haasan’s Vikram this year and Mani Ratnam has belligerently promoted PS-1 across pan-Indian media as never seen before in his career.
The Tamil industry is anxiously waiting to see if the Chola period drama can beat the collections of Shankar and Rajinikanth’s #2Point0 to emerge as the all-time highest grosser of Tamil cinema.
But 2.0’s collections were helped by the Hindi and Telugu market. Both the markets contributed around 300 crores net. The brand value of Robot, Shankar, and the presence of Akshay Kumar helped 2.0 to garner such numbers.
But PS-1 has not been able to create such a buzz with its Hindi or Telugu version. So it will be interesting to see where Ponniyin Selvan will end its box office run.
