Year Ender 2022: Bollywood's new mantra of king-size content, Hollywood rides on MCU, DC and epic sequels

Bollywood aka the Hindi film industry produces the maximum number of films in the calendar year across the globe. Yes, approximately more than 1000 movies are released every year from Bollywood, which is more than double that of Hollywood, the largest entertainment industry in the world.

Ever since 2015’s Fast And Furious 7, which became the first Hollywood film in India to cross the 100-crore mark, the West has been conquering the East and trumping some of the major stars of the country. The biggest examples are Avengers: Endgame and Avatar: The Way Of Water, which emerged as gargantuan blockbusters. They trumped Bollywood biggies like Kalank and Cirkus respectively, making them bite the dust at the box-office. But this year, we have had some blockbusters here too.

The biggest entertainment industry of the country, Bollywood took a standstill due to the pandemic phase and when it re-opened full-fledged in 2022, the viewing pattern of the audience was completely changed. In the pre-pandemic era, it was observed that even small films with strong content used to get footfalls from the cinegoers. But due to the OTT boom and exploration of international content, the dynamics of cinema viewing changed and it affected big-time to the Hindi film industry.

No more cut-copy-paste

In the pre-pandemic phase, we saw several south & Hollywood remakes like Singham, Wanted, Ghajini, Kabir Singh, Baaghi 2, Simmba and others performing phenomenally well at the box office. But as many moviegoers watched Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam and international content on OTT during the pandemic with the help of subtitles and dubbed audios, they showed no interest in remakes and we saw maximum of them failing at the box office despite featuring big names. The list includes Bachchhan Paandey , remake of Jigarthanda (Rs 49.98 crore), Jersey , remake of the Telugu film of the same name (Rs 19.68 crore) Hit – The First Case , remake of the Telugu film of the same name (Rs 11.78 crore), Laal Singh Chaddha , remake of Forrest Gump (Rs 58.73 crore), Do Baaraa , remake of Mirage (Rs 5.35 crore) and Vikram Vedha , remake of the Tamil film of the same name (Rs 78.66 crore).

The failure of these Hindi movies proved that audiences want to see original content with an intriguing storyline. In the string of flop remakes, only Ajay Devgn’s Drishyam 2 clicked at the box office (Rs 230 crore*) due to the cult status of the first part and lead characters making a special place in the audience’s heart.

In an exclusive interview with Firstpost, filmmaker Madhur Bhandarkar emphasized that Bollywood should work on original scripts and said, “We need to work on original scripts and give writers the kind of freedom he wants and do less copy-pasting. Cinema has to change for the better and we have it in us. We have the talent and writers also. But happens we give a link to an English film and ask him to make a few changes and keep the subject of the film exactly the same, then what will the writers do? He also has to survive.”

Cinematic experience with larger-than-life stories  

In this tough year for Bollywood, it was also observed that the audience is no more rooting for big stars and are preferring larger-than-life content, which will give them an exhilarating cinematic experience.

While Akshay Kumar delivered four duds at the box office this year with Bachchhan Paandey, Samrat Prithviraj (Rs 68.05 crore), Raksha Bandhan (Rs 44.39 crore) and Ram Setu (Rs 71.87 crore), Ranveer Singh’s both releases of 2022, Jayeshbhai Jordaar (Rs 15.59 crore) and Cirkus (Rs 20.85 crore) bombed at the ticket windows.

Ranbir Kapoor’s Brahmastra Part 1: Shiva (Rs 257.44 crore) and Alia Bhatt’s Gangubai Kathiawadi (Rs 129.10 crore) are the only epic Bollywood films, which made the cash registers during its theatrical run.

Interestingly, south-Indian films were more successful to attract the Hindi audience with their larger-than-life content and stories and films like KGF 2 (Rs 434.70 crore), RRR (Rs 274.31 crore), Ponniyin Selvan: I (Rs 25.10 crore) and Kantara (Rs 79.25 crore) are classic examples of that.

Amidst the uncertainty of Bollywood at the box office, we also saw two biggest surprising blockbusters of the year in the form of The Kashmir Files (Rs 252.90 crore) and Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 (Rs 185.92 crore).

Hollywood rides on big stars, sequels and franchise films in India

Talking about Hollywood, there was no major shift at the Indian box office or viewing pattern of the audience as once again we saw MCU and DC fans flocking to cinema halls to watch their superheroes on the silver screen. Films like The Batman (Rs 48.10 crore), Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (Rs 130 crore), Thor: Love And Thunder (Rs 101.71 crore), Black Adam (Rs 48.13 crore) and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (Rs 69.55 crore) turned out to be money-spinners at the ticket windows.

However, the show-stealers were epic sequels like Top Gun: Maverick (Rs 34.50 crore), Jurassic World Dominion (Rs 68.56 crore) and Avatar: The Way of Water (Rs 265 crore), which set new benchmarks at the box office based on their expectations. Talking about the latter, it has all the potential to beat Avengers: Endgame (Rs 373.22 crore) to become the highest Hollywood grosser of all time in India.

Here’s a comparison of the box-office of the biggest hits of 2022 from Bollywood and Hollywood:

Bollywood Films

The Kashmir Files: Rs 246 crore

Brahmastra: Rs. 230 crore

Drishyam 2: Rs 218 crore (and counting)

Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2: Rs 181 crore

Gangubai Kathiawadi: Rs 126 crore

Hollywood Films

Avatar: The Way Of Water: Rs 274 crore (and counting)

Jurassic Park: World Dominion: Rs 68 crore

Top Gun Maverick: Rs 48 crore

Doctor Strange: Rs 129 crore

Thor Love and Thunder: Rs 101 crore

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever: Rs 71 crore

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