Filmmaker Mudassar Aziz opened up about the commercial underperformance of his latest release, the Akshay Kumar-starrer Khel Khel Mein. In an interview, he said that the film’s performance and reception has been bittersweet for the cast and crew. While the film opened to mostly positive reviews, it was barely able to crack the Rs 30 crore mark at the box office, continuing Akshay’s flop-streak. The actor has delivered a string of commercial failures in recent years.
In an interview with Zoom Entertainment, Mudassar Aziz said that the WhatsApp group chat that he is a part of with the film’s cast is still very much active, but noted that the bittersweet feeling can be felt there as well. He went on to suggest that the film might have been required a certain ‘mental intelligence’ that was lacking in the audience.
Also read – Mudassar Aziz on Akshay Kumar: ‘Form is temporary but class is permanent’
He said, “My biggest learning has been that there is a very large chunk of our theatre-going, ticket-buying Hindi cinema audience has very heavily tilted in the age group of 15-30. This audience will buy tickets depending on several factors, which are sometimes not related to how much they would enjoy your film. The film needs to come across like an event. And an event precedes itself, before the quality of the film.”
Asked if he was able to project Khel Khel Mein like an event, the filmmaker said, “Let’s start with choice of story, let’s start with economic strata, let’s start with maturity of mind required to comprehend a film such as Khel Khel Mein. Why talk about marketing and release date? There’s a certain mental intelligence, a certain awareness about relationships; there is a prerequisite to Khel Khel Mein. It’s not an out-and-out entertainer, it’s asking questions about relationships, about marriages, about orientations…”
The filmmaker said that all these factors play a role when a viewer is deciding whether or not to spend money on a movie ticket. Also starring Taapsee Pannu, Ammy Virk, Fardeen Khan, Pragya Jaiswal, Aditya Seal and others. The movie debuted alongside the runaway blockbuster Stree 2, and the John Abraham-starrer Vedaa.
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