Kamal Haasan's much-anticipated gangster action film, "Thug Life," released on June 5th, 2025, but audience response has been disappointing. The film is struggling at the box office in its first week, with earnings significantly lower than expected.
Thug Life Box Office Collection Day 7: Kamal Haasan's highly anticipated film "Thug Life" has had an unexpected box office journey. Despite a massive budget and star power, the film failed to draw audiences to theaters. The declining earnings and dwindling show numbers after seven days clearly indicate that the initial buzz around "Thug Life" has significantly faded.
Thug Life's 'Thug' Week
"Thug Life" collected only ₹50 lakh by 4 PM on its seventh day (Thursday), a highly disappointing figure for a mega-budget film. The film's total seven-day collection has reached only ₹41.5 crore. This figure shows that the film, made on a budget of ₹200 crore, has not even recovered a quarter of its production cost.
On its June 5th release, the film had 4917 shows across the country. Of these, 1535 were in Hindi, 2503 in Tamil, 777 in Telugu, and the rest in IMAX 2D and 4DX formats. However, by the seventh day, this number has shrunk to just 2089 shows. Now, only 1290 shows remain in Tamil, 218 in Hindi, and 581 in Telugu. This reduction indicates that theater owners have started removing shows, anticipating the film's poor performance.
Reasons Behind the Film's Declining Performance
Several key factors contributed to "Thug Life's" failure:
- Impact of Kannada-Tamil dispute: Due to controversies surrounding anti-Kannada sentiments in the film, it was not released in Karnataka. This resulted in the film losing a significant South Indian market.
- Clash with "Housefull 5": The film faced competition from Akshay Kumar's comedy series "Housefull 5" from its first day of release. The b fan base of the "Housefull" franchise diverted a considerable portion of the audience.
- Weak script and lengthy duration: Both audiences and critics criticized the film's weak script. Its long duration and slow narrative also bored viewers.
- Lack of marketing: While other big films engage in aggressive promotion, "Thug Life's" promotional campaign was lackluster. From social media to ground-level activities, the film's outreach was weak.
The box office failure of a high-budget film like "Thug Life" serves as a stark reminder to filmmakers that a film cannot solely rely on star cast and visual effects. Audiences are now more focused on content, and their preferences have changed.
