Chennai weekend box-office

Source: Moviebuzz       12/11/04

Heavy rains in Chennai during the Diwali weekend have dampened the box-office especially the new Tamil releases. Out of five films released for the festival, Ajith's Attakasam (Rs 14.5 Lakhs net) is the clear winner closely followed by Silambarasan's Manmathan(Rs 13.85 Lakhs net). Sarath Kumar's Chatrapathy is a border-line case while Vijaykanth's Niranja Manasu and Dhanush's Dreams are total disasters.
Sharukh Khan's Veer-Zaara is the number one at the Chennai BO with an impressive Rs 17 Lakhs from four screens in the first four days of its release including Id Monday. 7-G Rainbow Colony continues to do well and is at the fourth position and M.Kumaran Son Of Mahalakshmi is at the fifth place.

Film Cast Pluses Minuses Trade fact

Veer-Zaara Shah Rukh Khan, Preity Zinta, Rani Mukherjee The banner, its cast and excellent marketing Slow paced with a predictable story and no major surprises. Fantastic opening at four screens with Rs 17 Lakhs net collections.

Attakasam Ajith, Pooja, Babu Antony, Sujatha, Haneefa Ajith's double role and his screen presence Lewd dialogues and rehash of earlier fares Distributors are happy that after two years an Ajith film is profitable!

Manmathan Silambarasan, Jyothika, Goundamani, Atul Kulkarni An excellent taut thriller with Simbu's surprise performance, music and camera. Is attracting only the youth and lady audience has nothing in it. Production cost being high, the film may break-even.

7-G Rainbow Colony Ravi Krishna, Sonia Agarwal Solid story with good presentation. Yuvan's music and Sonia's performance. A contrived ending and the length of the film. Has taken a bumper opening all over Tamil Nadu. The distributors will recover their cost in the first week itself.

M.Kumaran Son of Mahalakshmi Ravi, Nadia Moidu, Asin, Prakash Raj, Vivek Nadiya Moidu and Ravi combination as mother and son. They are the lifeline of the film Too mushy in the second half which is highly melodramatic In Chennai collections are steady with family audience appreciating it.

(Ratings are based on the box office collections and the cost of the film)
 

The 'Soured' Friendship

Source: Cinesouth       13/11/04

The film "Attagasam" got released only after great struggle. The sufferer is the hero "Ajith", thanks to his long time friend and the producer of this movie.

Ajith gave call sheets to his friend turned producer Karthikeyan, though he had already committed to two films, 'Ji' and 'Mirattal' in the first place. He had completed the movie 'Attagasam' by giving priority to this movie than the other two films.

'Attagasam' which was really to get released in 'Diwali' faced stiff resistance from many quarters. The reason was that the producer Karthikeyan didn't settle the agreed amount to many people who worked for the movie. For the "Art Director" alone, he owed to the tune of Rs.15Lakhs. Apart from him,the director and the hero also didn't get paid full.

Ajith came to know this problem only at the last moment. Himself and the director of the film Saran tried very hard and made peace with the opposing parties. Only after this, the film was allowed to be released. The producer of this movie Karthikeyan is a close friend of Ajith, but his way of handling things didn't please Ajith a bit.

He got very upset about the whole affair. So he called his friend Karthikeyan and told him plainly, that he will not have anything to do with him in the future. One needs to safeguard friendship as one does with chastity.