The Dark Knight Rises grosses ₹ 25 crore in first three days

Mumbai: The Dark Knight Rises, the lastest Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. film with Christian Bale as Batman, generated nearly ₹ 25 crore in its opening weekend in India, more than what Dar Media Pvt. Ltd paid to secure the domestic distribution rights.

Dar Media has paid almost ₹ 18 crore for the all-India theatrical distribution rights. The only other Hollywood film to have been sold to a single theatrical distributor was Spider-Man 3 released in 2007. The film’s Indian distribution rights were sold by Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc. to Percept Picture Co. for around ₹ 15 crore.

However, the fourth edition of Spider-Man, The Amazing Spider-Man, released on 29 June, was sold to individual distributors, which is the traditional industry practice.

Warner Bros. and Dar Media executives said the film has grossed around ₹ 25 crore in its first three days.

The first of the Batman series, Batman Begins, was released in 2005 across 70 screens (57 prints) and generated around ₹ 1.36 crore in the first three days from the Indian box-office, while the sequel, The Dark Knight, which released in 2008 across 250 screens (210 prints) earned around ₹ 3.8 crore in the opening weekend, according to Warner Bros.

The record for being the highest Hollywood grosser in India in the opening weekend is held by The Amazing Spider-Man released on 29 June. The film generated ₹ 34 crore for Sony Pictures Entertainment.

“However, if you consider the ticket sales per print, The Dark Knight Rises scores higher in earnings than The Amazing Spider-Man during the first three days of release,” said Murli Chhatwani, distribution head, Dar Media.

The Dark Knight Rises was released with around 650 prints across 700 screens, while The Amazing Spider-Man released across 1,500 screens, which helped notch up its box-office revenue in the first three days, said the Warner executive cited earlier.

“The Dark Knight Rises opened to almost houseful on Friday and during the weekend, too, the frenzy continued. But the box-office collection would have been higher if the film was in 3D since the ticket prices are higher for 3D films,” said Girish Wankhede, a spokesman for Cinemax India Ltd.

The movie’s run time (2 hours 45 minutes) is also longer than that of The Amazing Spider-Man and, as a result, the shows were fewer. “On Friday, across theatre chains almost 50% shows were screening The Dark Knight Rises, but the number of shows were increased by over 15% on Saturday since the demand was high,” Ashish Saksena, chief operating officer, Big Cinemas.

“We are running the film to packed houses in screens where the movie is slated,” said Gautam Datta, chief executive, PVR Ltd.

Warner Bros. will release the official box-office collection figures on Tuesday. The studio does not want to release official numbers as a mark of respect to the people who lost their lives in a shooting in Colorado on Friday, said the Warner executive.

aminah.sheikh@livemint.com