How Ranbir Kapoor's Animal success is bigger than Shah Rukh Khan's Jawan, Pathaan & Sunny Deol's Gadar 2 | Rewind 2023

After a terrible 2022, 2023 has turned out to be a landmark year for Bollywood with four films entering the Rs 500 crore club – Jawan, Pathaan, Gadar 2 and Animal. But there is something more special about the latter as it has shattered several norms and rules and emerged as a monstrous blockbuster across the globe. Undoubtedly, the film garnered polarising views including criticism over problematic and triggering scenes but one can’t deny the fact that it has set new benchmarks and turned out to be a phenomenon.

While Animal is still going strong at the box office with Rs 537 crore and counting, let’s decode how the Ranbir Kapoor starrer has turned out to be a bonafide blockbuster in an unconventional way.

‘A’ certification

If the film gets an ‘A’ certificate, it loses the majority of its audience (school kids and junior college students who are below 18) including the family audience. Despite this humongous factor, Animal registered great numbers due to its impressive narrative and craft with impeccable performances of the ensemble and chartbuster music album being the cherry on the cake.

Long runtime

In the time, when filmmakers are trimming the duration of their movies to get the maximum shows in cinema halls, Sandeep Reddy Vanga made sure not to compromise with his narrative and storytelling. The film had a long runtime of over 3 hours and 21 minutes. Well, with this duration a single screen can accommodate only 4 shows while a multiplex can have 6 shows per day. The long runtime often affects the box office numbers of a film but not in the case of Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s directorial.

No National holiday or festive release

Shah Rukh Khan’s Pathaan, which also had the advantage of being a part of YRF Spy Universe, released around Republic Day and enjoyed an extended weekend of 5 days, on the other hand, Jawan hit the screens on Janmashtami and had an extended weekend of 4 days. Talking about Sunny Deol’s Gadar 2, it had the benefit of being the sequel to an all-time blockbuster. While it enjoyed a huge advantage on Independence Day, it clashed with Akshay Kumar and Pankaj Tripathi’s OMG 2 at the box office.

Now, Animal not being any franchise film or sequel released during a normal weekend without the benefit of festivals or National holidays. It also faced huge competition at the ticket windows in the form of Vicky Kaushal starrer Sam Bahadur. Despite all these factors it emerged as a blockbuster certified by the janta-janardhan and not by trolls or so-called experts.

Animal also features Rashmika Mandanna, Anil Kapoor, Bobby Deol, Triptii Dimri, Suresh Oberoi, Prem Chopra, Sonali Batra, Siddharth Karnick and others in prominent roles.

The sequel of the film titled Animal Park is expected to arrive in 2026.