Salman Khan's Prem Ratan Dhan Payo claims Bollywood debut record

In this week’s roundup of the global box-office scene:
• Salman Khan and Fox Star’s new record is a matter of box-office interpretation
• Spectre sets record for 2D opening in China
• Michael Fassbender still yet to open a top-level movie after Steve Jobs tanks

Salmania in the house … Sonam Kapoor and Salman Khan in Prem Ratan Dhan Payo. Photograph: 20th Century Fox/Everett/Rex Shutterstock

Prem Ratan Dhan Payo review – Salman Khan's sensitive side on show

Salman Khan’s stellar year (box office-wise – let’s not dwell on the other stuff) continued with his new romantic drama Prem Ratan Dhan Payo opening at approximately 130 crore ($19.7m). Distributors Fox Star are spinning this as the highest Bollywood debut weekend ever: true, if you ignore the fact that this figure is for four days. Counted over the more typical Friday to Sunday frame, 89.3 crore actually clocks in as Bollywood’s sixth strongest start, with 2014’s Happy New Year (108.9 crore) and 2013’s Dhoom 3 (107.6 crore) still heading the list. All this follows Indian box-office sources; rather confusing was Fox Star’s claim on Sunday night, via the Rentrak chart below, that Khan’s film had done $27m domestically, which would be a ridiculous 178 crore. Presumably this is a gross figure being used to create an impression of a crushing new record for Prem Ratan Dhan Payo (Indian box-office statistics, including the previous benchmarks supposedly beaten, are usually marked up net). Anyway, fixating on Bollywood does a disservice to July’s Telugu blockbuster Baahubali, the broad-shouldered outsider that with 140 crore is still India’s highest opener ever (whichever Prem Ratan figures you use) on a mere three-day count.

Whatever the truth, there’s no doubting that “Salmania” is more than intact after the star’s recent legal wrangles. He broke easily into the vaunted 100-crore ($15.1m) club during Eid in July with cross-border Indian-Pakistan tearjerker Bajrangi Bhaijaan (102.6 crore); the film wound up becoming Bollywood’s second most successful worldwide on 626 crore. Now Prem Ratan Dhan Payo – a Prince and the Pauper-style romance in which Khan reprises the Prem naif he has played several times for director Sooraj Barjatya – has done the same for Diwali, and presumably the Hindu demographic. Its three-day Indian debut looks a little shy of Bajrangi’s. The latter film, though, was especially strong overseas, and Prem is also holding its own there: the same $2.4m opening in the States; $1.5m (a Bollywood record) against Bajrangi’s $1.1m in the UK. So Khan – still in the hallowed group of Indian megastars along with fellow Khans Aamir and Shah Rukh – has the ninth 100-crore film of his career, and looks a shoe-in for the Bollywood top 10 list once more.