The devotional film Hanuman Ansh is looking to become the highest theatrical return on investment of all time The biggest ever till date is a another devotional film called Jai Santoshi Maa (1975) which had a production budget of 5 lakh and did a theatrical share of 4 crore apprx which is 80 times its budget. Although the initial budget was only 5 lakh with 16 prints it went much higher as many more prints were taken out to monetize the film as it was probably never thought it would break out the way it did. .
Hanuman Ansh has a production cost of 2 crore and should do a share of 50 crore at least which is 25 times the budget. But here marketing and prints costs are 1 crore which takes the total cost to 3 crore which means the theatrical share will be at least 17 times the total cost. The total cost of Jai Santoshi Maa (1975) after a year of its release would be around 25 lakh apprx or maybe a little more which means theatrical revenue 16 times its a total cost. Basically weird it may sound but Hanuman Ansh is a historical BLOCKBUSTER..
A film like Hum Aapke Hain Kaun (1994) went from 9 lakhs day one to 72 crore final business which is probably the biggest multiplier form day one to lifetime in the last 35 years. It is a multiplier of 800. Here the opening day was 8.50 lakh and the multiplier is going to be much higher than Hum Aapke Hain Kaun as Hanuman Ansh will reach 72 crore nett in the next 2-3 days. The biggest multiplier we have on record is the 1981 film Ek Duuje Ke Liye which went from 10k to 9 crore apprx. There will be others probably as well in terms of multiplier but many films have not been tabulated.
The takeaway from these films is thats its never about the screen count but the content and the public willing to watch that content. There are a lot of complainers in the industry about not getting screens but you will always get the screens your content deserves according to the audience out there to watch your film. Eventually its the public which decides the screen count and nobody can really fight against that. The collections of Hanuman Ansh till date are as follows.
