Cyrus bends it better than Beckham

Asish Samanta / TNN / Apr 6, 2006, 20:26 IST

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Being Cyrus has come in the same box-office league as Chronicles of Narnia and King Kong. Here's why, and how.

Being Cyrus has come in the same box-office league as Chronicles of Narnia and King Kong. Here's why, and how.
Almost two weeks and rave reviews later, Being Cyrus is still making waves. The figures speak for themselves. According to industry estimates, the film has attracted more than two lakh people to multiplexes, with a gross earning of over Rs 2 crores at the box office.
Industry sources reveal that Being Cyrus has actually clocked to a position at par with big-time Hollywood releases from December last year, namely Chronicles of Narnia and King Kong, which opened with a gross of 2.4 crores and 3.6 crores rupees respectively.
So what made Being Cyrus a success? Director Karan Johar, a film buff who never misses a good film, seems to have an explanation. "More than anything else, it was an amazingly structured movie. The edit pattern was flawless. It is a learning experience for many people that the Indian audience have moved on.

They don't have a problem accepting a movie that is so dark and gripping and also has a comical element," he says.
Being Cyrus has also touched another milestone that of being the best English movie out of India in terms of box-office collections. And who knows it better than Sanjeev Bijli, director, PVR Pictures Ltd and the distributor of the film?
..."The movie has done extraordinary business in Mumbai, Bangalore and Pune. The gross collection nationwide is at par with Hindi super-hits and overruns collections from other Indian English movies like Bend it Like Beckham and Bride and Prejudice, making it the highest grossing Indian English film, so far.

We released with over 85 prints across the country, which by itself is a record for any English movie coming out of India," he says.
So, what drew crowds to the theatres to watch this film? Box office analyst, Taran Adarsh, explains, "The audience loved the abstract storyline which was refreshingly different. The director's approach to filmmaking is honest and not adulterated by commercialisation.
I went to see a Parsi movie, but the story was so real and I got so involved with the plot that everything else took a backseat." That Being Cyrus has transcended the boundaries of the community it portrays, to appeal to everybody is perhaps the secret to its success. As Adarsh sums it up, "A film like this signals the arrival of new cinema.
Times are changing and different concepts are being attempted. We can show to the West that we can come up with great stories and movies." That, of course is something to queue up for.

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