TBT: Box office report Judaai (1997): Sridevi announces retirement, Jan 1998

Judaai (1997)

The Telugu original Shubhalagnam was a super-hit. Yet, no actor wanted to do the Hindi remake, imagine being sold by your wife to another woman for Rs 2 crore! Even Anil Kapoor admitted he was distinctly uncomfortable with this "different" role but was coaxed into doing it by his father and the film's producer Surinder Kapoor. The film brought him back into the reckoning and was also a surprise comeback for the new mama Sridevi. It was rangeeli Urmilla's second big grosser in a sober, sacrificing and saree-clad role.

Sold for Rs 1.23 crore per major territory, this unorthodox ladies film was a slow starter. But collections remained steady at a modest 75 per cent, at a time when films getting a 100 per cent initial crashed after the first week. This was the only woman's film of 1997 and obviously it struck a chord specially in commercial centres like Mumbai where according to a tongue-in-cheek trade analyst, a woman would have no qualms about selling her husband for a TV, micro oven and a new fangled dish washer! Changing your pati parmeshawar [hsuband] was the liberated Indian miss would probably argue, any day better than a quick divorce!

In the North, in places like Delhi and UP, the film did only average business possibly because the society there is still pretty conservative. Even in Mumbai, in the more rural Thane belt, the film wasn't much of a crowd-puller. The distributor there will probably have lost a couple of lakhs on his investment but elsewhere in the city, its distributors have had an unexpected bonus. Being a remake, it was not a mega hit down South but was a good earner. Overseas, though it had an amazing run probably because Anil Kapoor is a big draw abroad and the film appealed to the NRIs there who are always attracted to a story with a difference.

This will probably be Sridevi's last film. The lady has announced her decision to quit show business at the end of the year.

-- Screen, Jan 2, 1998