Aamir Khan’s wrestling biopic Dangal is still going strong at the Chinese box office and has become the first Indian film to gross over SGD 430.2 million (INR 2000 crore). According to a report by Forbes, on its 53rd day of release in China yesterday, Dangal made SGD 537,750 (INR2.5 crore) at the China box office taking its worldwide total past the SGDs 430 million mark.
The Forbes report read, “It (Dangal) stands alone as the leggiest film in Chinese box office history with an opening day multiple of 86x. The closest contender to that record is Zootopia—like Dangal, incidentally, a film funded and distributed by Disney—but Dangal left Zootopia in its dust long ago when it surpassed the animated family film’s multiple of 69x.”
Dangal has overtaken international hits like Captain America: Civil War, xXx: Return Of Xander Cage, Transformers: Dark Of The Moon, The Jungle Book, Kung Fu Panda 3 etc at the China box office.
Dangal has become the fifth highest-grossing non-English film in history, the highest-grossing live action-sports movie of 2017, and the biggest non-Hollywood import ever released in China. In the rest of the world, including India where Dangal released in December 2016, the film earned INR 745 crore.
Dangal also brought unprecedented popularity for Aamir in China. While the actor’s films such as 3 Idiots had done well in China earlier, he now is more popular than PM Narendra Modi in China, according to social media followers on Weibo, the Chinese Twitter.
Talking about its success at second BRICS Film Festival, Chinese filmmaker Lu Chuan said, “Dangal has inspired Chinese filmmakers. Its actors are now megastars in our country though there wasn’t a lot of promotion for it in China. I think Indian films really taught us a lesson this time. Chinese audiences are easily moved by such simple, straightforward and beautiful stories.”