Wrestling drama Dangal beats Bollywood box office records
Film starring Indian actor Aamir Khan based on true story of two female champions earns £41.7m in three weeks. A film about two female wrestlers helmed by the Indian megastar Aamir Khan has become the highest-grossing Bollywood film of all time, earning £41.7m in three weeks.
Dangal, directed by Nitesh Tiwari, is based on the true story of wrestling champions Geeta and Babita Phogat, sisters who achieved firsts for Indian wrestling at the Commonwealth and Olympic Games. “Dangal” is a Hindi word used to describe a wrestling competition.
Khan, 51, plays a father to two girls and as a coach, Mahavir Singh Phogat, who had hoped for sons he could turn into world-class grapplers, but sees the promise in his young daughters after they thrash two local boys who insult them.
The girls are initially reluctant but change their minds when they see the alternative for young women in the village: an early marriage and a lifetime of child-rearing and domestic labour.
The film’s box office returns surpassed 3.45bn rupees at the weekend, according to the industry website Bollywood Hungama, putting its earnings above the 2014 science fiction movie PK – another Khan film.