Half Girlfriend, Hindi Medium box office collection: Both films going steady and safe

Last week saw two releases, coming from different genres and budgets, contesting each other at the box-office. While Half Girlfriend was a big budget movie starring Arjun Kapoor and Shraddha Kapoor, Hindi Medium was carried forward by the acting genius Irrfan Khan and Pakistani actress Saba Qamar.

Half Girlfriend vs. Hindi Medium. Image: Firstpost

Hindi Medium received good reviews for its content and performance spearheaded by Khan and it also got a tax-free status in Maharashtra and Gujarat. On the other hand, Half Girlfriend received a lot of flak and got trolled in social media.

A Firstpost opinion piece on Half Girlfriend, says, "The issue that plagues this film is that it does not come across as a love story, which has oodles of yearning involved. It looks contrived, soulless and haphazard."

While, Hindi Medium being a small-budget film, received decent remarks. Anna Vetticad's review said, "The film’s achievement is that it tells us things we already know yet forces us to think about them, and has lots of fun while doing so."

Both these films, after 5 days in theatres, are seeing a steady rise at the box-office. After Badrinath Ki Dulhaniya, there hasn't been any film which has surpassed the 40 crore mark.

Koimoi.com reports that in just over the weekend, both the films combined have been able to pull in over 40 crore. While Half Girlfriend's share is 33 crore, Hindi Medium contributed 12.50 crores. Owing to the budget these films have been made at, the revenue garnered so far is pretty decent.

Half Girlfriend has been made in a budget of 50 crore. With the other sources of revenue — the sales of satellite, music and other rights (36 crore) — the money pouring in from the box-office is going to be surplus. On the other hand Hindi Medium, also been made on a minimal budget of 22 crore, has been able to recover 15 crore already through sales of digital, satellite, music and overseas.

Trade analyst Taran Adarsh tweeted about the box-office reports of these two films.