Hip Hop Tamizha Aadhi's sequel outpaced same-week rival Dorathy on day one, riding pre-release hit songs and a family-friendly certificate into a packed opening weekend.
Nine years after the original made him a director and a leading man in the same breath, Hip Hop Tamizha Aadhi is back with Meesaya Murukku 2, and the opening numbers suggest the sequel found its crowd fast.
The film, produced by Khushbu Sundar, released on September 25 across roughly 1,530 screens in India and pulled in about Rs 3.30 crore on day one, according to Filmibeat Tamil. Occupancy touched 40 percent on the opening day, which for a musical comedy-drama without a big theatrical event around it is a solid number.
Much of that credit goes to the soundtrack landing well ahead of the film itself. Songs like "Ava Aaraa 10/10" and "Govindamma" were already running as hits before release day, and Filmibeat Tamil notes theatres have effectively turned into concert halls, with the crowd singing and dancing along once the tracks show up on screen. The film opens on a song called "Lakshmi" and keeps stacking the hits from there, per the report.
The first Meesaya Murukku, back in 2017, topped out at around Rs 18 crore and was counted a hit. This time, the sequel arrives with three heroines sharing screen space, Chaitra Achar, Ramya Ranganathan and Gethika Sharma, alongside a supporting cast of Karunas, Baba Bhaskar, Nassar and Yogi Babu. Filmibeat Tamil credits the ensemble with pulling its weight, adding that between the cast and the songs, Sundar's production looks set to recover its money.
Where Meesaya Murukku 2 has an edge is the certificate. It's a U-rated family watch, unlike Dorathy, which carries an A and opened the day before to just Rs 69 lakh, well behind Aadhi's film on the same comparison. With quarterly school holidays announced this week, the expectation among trade watchers, as cited by Filmibeat Tamil, is that Saturday and Sunday could see families turning out in numbers neither film has managed yet on a weekday.
It's not the only clash in Tamil cinema screens this week. Ashok Selvan's Anbil Avan is also out, and social media chatter has been comparing notes on all three, Paradise, Dorathy and Meesaya Murukku 2, jostling for the same audience's Friday-to-Sunday attention. Meanwhile Suriya's Mandaadi, now 16 days into its run, is still pulling in over a crore a day, Rs 1.06 crore on day 16 by Filmibeat Tamil's count, proof that a strong word of mouth film doesn't need a second weekend to keep going.
On Filmibeat Tamil's own tally, Meesaya Murukku 2's Rs 3.3 crore start puts it ahead in the race to be called this week's box office winner, though Dorathy's slower opening and Mandaadi's older-film staying power mean the final answer won't be clear before the weekend collections are in. Whether Aadhi's sequel can hold that occupancy through Saturday and Sunday, with the holiday crowd factored in, is the number to watch next.
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