Bajrangi Bhaijaan and Baahubali clash in India's heavyweight box office battle

Indian heavyweights First of all, let’s catch up with the Indian big boys not mentioned on Rentrak’s chart. After a leaden first six months at the box office there, July has thrown up a titanic tussle between two megastars: moustachioed Telugu supremo Prahbas, and his war epic Baahubali, and Muslim main man Salman Khan, and his cross-border drama Bajrangi Bhaijaan. Baahubali, the country’s much-trumpeted most expensive production to date, at $40m, was looking unbeatable after its record-breaking debut weekend on 10-12 July; its global take was 450 crore ($70.1m) after 17 days on release at the close of this weekend, according to the International Business Times. Which puts it in third place on the list of highest grossing Indian films, overtaking Shahrukh Khan’s 2013 romcom Chennai Express (423 crore) and leaving just Aamir Khan vehicles Dhoom 3 (542 crore) and PK (740 crore) above it. But on the strength of what looks like a phenomenal overseas performance – reflecting Salman Khan’s wider celebrity, not to mention the interest in the manslaughter case hanging over him – Bajrangi Bhaijaan looks to be on almost level pegging after just 10 days on deck. Wikipedia currently quotes it at 437 crore globally, which would mean it’s taken nearly 200 crore outside of India, better than any Bollywood release apart from PK. Bajrangi Bhaijaan is a very Bollywood affair – an attempt to gild Salman Khan with some of his namesake Aamir’s altruistic grace. A broad-shouldered CGI spectacular that holds its own with the best of Hollywood, Baahubali has more crossover appeal, so let’s hope non-Indian audiences get the opportunity to lap it up. Local hero The Chinese box office has a new champ: Monster Hunt, the $35m CGI/live-action fantasy from Hong Kong-born Shrek the Third director Raman Hui, had reached $220m at time of writing, passing 2012 buddy comedy Lost in Thailand ($204m) to become the highest grossing domestic film ever. It’s undoubtedly benefitted from the July moratorium on new Hollywood films, but its performance has been explosive all the same – taking almost as much as Ant-Man’s international run so far in just its home market plus a handful of Asian territories. Following a medieval village official impregnated with the tentacled heir to the monster kingdom, Monster Hunt is, according to Screen International’s tentatively positive write-up, “wholly Chinese in its portrayal of mythology, folklore and politics”. At the same time, it feels like a step forward for the industry: the traditional elements that often restrict native film-makers have been finally lathered up into something new. The inability to dream up new, galvanic formats has beenpartly responsible for Chinese cinema’s lack of progress abroad, so it’ll be interesting to see if Monster Hunt attracts attention beyond the diaspora. No questioning progress on the box-office front, though: in the first six months of this year, China was up 52% on the same period in 2014 (which was a 35% improvement on 2013). The No 1 local-film record has been broken three times since the turn of the decade: by 2010’s earthquake drama Aftershock, Lost in Thailand, and now Monster Hunt. Compare that to three times in nearly 40 years in the US: Star Wars in 1977, Titanic in 1997 and Avatar in 2009. Top five Chinese domestic films 1. Monster Hunt (2015), 1.370bn yuan ($220m) 2. Lost in Thailand (2012), 1.268bn yuan ($204m) 3. Journey to the West (2013), 1.247bn yuan ($201m) 4. Breakup Buddies (2014), 1.170bn yuan ($188m) 5. The Monkey King (2014), 1.045bn yuan ($168m) Arcade dire After scoring an implausible 14 $100m+ US domestic hits since 1998, lowbrow king Adam Sandler may have dented his commercial prospects trying to reinvent himself for the blockbuster crowd in Pixels. Sony’s high-concept sci-fi comedy – based on Patrick Jean’s short film in which aliens unleash 80s videogame favourites on the Earth – had outsider potential in this year’s box-office race, and with his track record, Sandler’s presence in the ensemble looked like a bonus. But it’s opened at $24m in the US, a long way under $69m for The Lego Movie, which the studio was using as a yardstick overseas. If the marketing whizzed along appealingly thanks to Pac-Man, Donkey Kong et al, an awkward fact couldn’t be avoided in the actual film: Sandler unbalances proceedings, his typical lazy comedy filling the film with indulgent, nostalgic skits that continually threaten to bog down the neat visuals. Caught between this generational wallowing and the more urgent needs of an action film, Pixels was neither the four-quadrant all-embracer it might have been, nor did it successfully home in on any one group. It was too Sandler-ish and not sharp enough for the hipster crowd who might have been seduced by retro airs; not full enough of Sandler schtick for his core fanbase (his PG-13 work tends to open in the $40m vicinity); and surprisingly, with 62% of the US audience under 25, it looks like not too many 80s arcade-heads showed up either. But stop me if you’ve heard this before: Sandler’s lingering international appeal may win Pixels an extra life. $21.4m from 56 overseas territories isn’t particularly strong, but there were enough bright spots to give Sony some hope, especially on a frugal $88m budget. Latin America, where Sandler’s comedies go down a treat, was pumping in the quarters: Mexico ($3.7m) was almost level with The Lego Movie ($3.8m), and fellow No 1 debuts Brazil ($3.1m/$1.7m) and Argentina ($2.3m/$657K) were well ahead. The Argentine figure was the eighth highest opening in the country ever, and a record for Sony. The $200m or so needed by Pixels for a slender profit will take some recovery. But backed partially by China Film Group, the film is sure to get a big push there when it opens there on 15 September. So not quite game over yet. Brain trust While Minions has been noisily swarming all over the summer CGI animation front, Pixar’s interior trek Inside Out has quietly claiming hearts and minds – and deserves more attention. Its staggered rollout, a few territories a week from mid-June onwards, means it never bashed the big box-office gong. But it’s discreetly amassed $550.1m already, making it the company’s eighth most successful film so far; $320.3m of that is the extremely impressive US take. Writer-director Pete Docter’s creative intrepidness and emotional acuity has been rewarded with consistent – 40ish% holds in the States – and Inside Out has been commanding similar loyalty elsewhere. Japan and Korea both dropped just -27% this week, and Australia actually saw +35% and +27% leaps in its third and fourth frames. The big opening this time ($10.9m in the UK) was one of Pixar’s best 21st-century starts here, only bested by the more obviously commercial Finding Nemo ($12.3m), The Incredibles ($18.4m) and Toy Story 3 ($32.7m). Heartening to see that emotional depth can still put bums on multiplex seats. Inside Out should comfortably pass Cars 2 ($559.9m worldwide), Ratatouille ($623.7m) and The Incredibles ($631.4m) for fifth place on the Pixar scoreboard. A really stellar performance in its 20 or so remaining markets, which include a reputed October Chinese release, could see it past Docter’s own Up ($731.3m) and Monsters University ($743.6m), and in the Pixar stratosphere with Finding Nemo and Toy Story 3; unimaginable for what looked like their trickiest proposition for years. Beyond Hollywood Elsewhere, Chinese superhero spoof Jian Bing Man (Pancake Man) was still cooking, with audiences there in the mood for more homemade fare after Monster Hunt – it took another $35.7m for fifth place on the worldwide chart. Not included in those figures, for some reason, was a scorching screen average from a 13-screen US release, in what Chinese apparatchiks will be praying is the start of an international surge for their wares. In ninth place globally with $19.5m was South Korean period thriller The Assassination, with Choi-Dong Hoon, director of 2012’s fantastically exciting Ocean’s Eleven ripoff The Thieves, returning with a tale of 1930s resistance fighters striking back against Japanese occupation. Only You, a Chinese remake of the Marisa Tomei-Robert Downey Jr comedy starring Lust, Caution actor Tang Wei, nabbed 15th place with $7m. And also from that way, the fifth in the Seer animated series based on an online game touted as the local Pokemon made $4m this weekend, and 18th global spot. The future It’s round five of global-espionage hokum for Tom Cruise and Paramount as Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation slinks forth in close to 40 markets, about half of its rollout. The fourth, Ghost Protocol, arrested a decline in the series, with an upswing in international-playboy globe-trotting and its star putting his life on the line on Dubai’s Burj Khalifa lifting it to a series high of $694.7m. But the Cruiser is going higher this time in his pursuit of jaw-dropping real-life self-endangerment – clinging to the side of an airplane, a piece of madness he apparently performed eight times – so for his pains he’ll be hoping the box office follows suit. Hollywood is still persona non grata in China, until Terminator: Genisys emerges from the portal on 23 August. So a little time remains to shore up local market share, and the coming weekend’s triple salvo should chip in. John Woo casts off with the second part of his “Chinese Titanic”, The Crossing, about the 1949 sinking of the steamer Taiping en route to Taiwan; judging by the first part’s disappointing December run ($32.4m on a $48.6m budget), audiences there prefer their maritime disasters skippered by James Cameron. It’s up against $20m Chinese epic romance Lady of the Dynasty, starring local fave Fan Bingbing, and a first film in seven years for Hong Kong stalwart Ringo Lam, best known for 1987 classic City on Fire. This one’s called Wild City – a theme is emerging here. On the subcontinent, meanwhile, Singham headcracker Ajay Devgn headlines psychological thriller Drishyam, a remake of the 2013 Malayalam film of the same name. Playing a cinephile family man implicated in a murder in a Goa village, Devgn is taking a sidestep from his more flamboyant chest-baring extravanganzas. Probably good timing, with Baahubali still in town. Top 10 global box office, 24-26 July 1. Minions, $66.1m from 61 territories. $759.4m – 65.6% international; 34.4% US 2. Ant-Man, $60.2m from 49 territories. $226.5m – 53.2% int; 46.8% US 3. Monster Hunt, $46m from 5 territories. $211m – 100% int 4. Pixels, $45.4m from 57 territories. $49.4m – 51.4% int; 48.6% US 5. Inside Out, $35.7m from 52 territories. $550.1m – 41.8% int; 58.2% US 6. Jian Bing Man, $25m from 1 territory. $132m – 100% int 7. Paper Towns, $20.5m from 38 territories. $28.5m – 56.1% int; 43.9% US 8. (New) Southpaw, $20m from 5 territories – 17.5% int; 82.5% US 9. (New) The Assassination, $19.5m from 1 territory. $23m – 100% int 10. Trainwreck, $17.5m from 4 territories. $61.7m – 0.4% int; 99.6% US • Thanks to Rentrak. This week’s figures are based on estimates; all historical figures unadjusted, unless otherwise stated.