Alia Bhatt has many cards up her sleeve and she’s playing all of them right and how. If there’s one Bollywood A-lister who has realised the difference in content that attracts theatre-going audience and streaming audience, it’s Alia Bhatt. Her 2022 slate of movies are a testament of the fact that the 29 year old superstar knows what sells and where. Alia not only has her feet both in theatricals and OTT, but also is ruling the roost in both.
Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Gangubai Kathiawadi helmed by Alia Bhatt became the first post-omicron 100 crore domestic grosser from Bollywood. The film opened to 10+ crores on day one and then there are Bollywood A-lister male actors even failing to touch this number with their films today. The film also raked in moolah overseas and went on to become a huge box-office success. She followed up her year with SS Rajamouli’s magnum opus RRR, where she may not have had that much of a screentime as an actor, but was still one of the strongest selling points of the film in the North Indian circuit. RRR roared like no other and made records left, right and centre.
By the time Gangubai Kathiawadi released on Netflix worldwide, she already had two box-office blockbusters in her kitty in a span of two months. What happened later is for the history books. Gangubai Kathiawadi went on to become an unscathed phenomenon on Netflix worldwide for months. The film went on to become the most watched Non English film on Netflix at one point and consistently trended on top in many East Asian countries like South Korea, Hong Kong, China, Thailand, Indonesia, Taiwan etc..The film became immortal as it carved a way into pop-culture with tiktoks, viral tweets, Instagram reels, replicated looks etc etc. Soon after, RRR released on Netflix and one needs no introduction about what RRR did to the streamer. At one point Gangubai Kathiawadi and RRR were competing each other for Netflix Non-English Film records. While one appealed more to the South Asian and East Asian audiences, the other won over western audiences. Both tentpole films had one common point – Alia Bhatt.
The actor’s next release is a Netflix Original ‘Darlings‘, in the month of August. She is also co-producing the film alongside Shahrukh Khan’s Red Chillies. The official teaser of the film dropped today and surely stirred the pot like no other film this year. One cannot not think of the impact Andhadhun teaser generated after seeing the teaser of Darlings. Not only is Alia back in her Safeena avatar, the teaser also gave a hint at Alia’s character having shades of grey. The actor has a new side of hers to offer with every film and this time she is set to win over Netflix.. Once again. Athough Darlings was initially scheduled to be a theatrical release, it was a wise decision from the makers to go for a Netflix release because Dark Comedy is a risky genre considering changed sensibilities of theatre going audience today. Besides, Netflix also guarantees a widened worldwide audience especially given how popularity of the actor sky-rocketed after Gangubai Kathiawadi’s Netflix release.
Alia follows ‘Darlings’ with Brahmastra backed by Disney, the most awaited Hindi language tentpole film of the year (or let’s say years), that releases in the month of September. Not only is the film the most awaited of the year, but also has ardent movie fans turning into mythology-experts with so many theories and plot point discussions surrounding the film post it’s trailer release. With little to no knowledge about Alia’s character Isha in the film, most of the discussions on the film revolves around her.
The actor is also currently shooting for her Hollywood Debut ‘Heart of Stone’ alongside Gal Gadot. Heart of Stone is also a Netflix biggie due release late this year or early next year. With Gangubai Kathiawadi and RRR already making huge impact worldwide and Darlings, Brahmastra and Heart of Stone awaiting its turn to entertain audience, Alia Bhatt is surely going to have a smashing year/s ahead. Talk about an actor mixing up genres in a single year, balancing both the theatrical and streaming worlds equally and having the best of both worlds.
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