‘James’, the final commercial outing of Powerstar Puneeth Rajkumar, has met with tremendous success upon its theatrical release. The film managed to cross the 100 Crore mark at the box office within a matter of four days to become one of Puneeth’s biggest commercial hits of his career. The film opened in theatres on March 17th to unanimous support from the Kannada film industry and became the biggest Kannada release of all time in Karnataka.
And in this vein, director Chethan Kumar has come out with a special video message to all the film distributors and exhibitors. Thanking them all for the unconditional support offered so far, Chethan Kumar requested them to continue supporting the film in the coming days and further aid in its growth.
“This is a plea to all the theatre owners, exhibitors, and distributors of ‘James’. Thanks to your support so far in the wide release that ‘James’ has become a massive success across Karnataka. I would request you all to continue supporting the film in its second week run as well because we have been receiving phone calls from several fans who have shared that despite a great performance, the film’s being replaced in many cinema halls by new releases.
There are lakhs of fans out there who still haven’t managed to watch the film and are eager to do so – also, considering that ‘James’ is Appu sir’s final commercial film and it has a really special place in the hearts of our people. Kindly continue supporting us,” urged Chethan Kumar in his video message.
‘James’ enjoyed a free-run, so to speak, at the box office as the sole Kannada film playing in theatres in the first week of its release. However, with the mighty ‘RRR’ releasing on March 25th, many reports claim that distributors and exhibitors are prioritizing the Telugu film over ‘James’, thus curbing the latter’s successful run.
On the other hand, ‘RRR’ pre-release phase isn’t devoid of problems either as the #BoycottRRRinKarnataka trend emerged recently on social media. With the film’s distribution in Karnataka becoming a cause for rift among the local fans, who claim that despite the demand the Kannada dubbed version of the film has received no screen space, disheartened fans have urged for the film to be boycotted in the state.
