Deepika and Hrithik in a still from Fighter. (courtesy: YouTube)
Deepika Padukone and Hrithik Roshan's Fighter has finally hit the theatres today [January 25]. The Siddharth Anand directorial proved itself to be unstoppable even ahead of its release. We say this as Fighter has minted Rs 8.4 crore by selling 2,79,367 tickets for day 1 through advance booking, across India, reported Sacnilk. The aerial action drama has so far sold 1,25,868 tickets in the Hindi 2D version and 1,38,503 tickets in the Hindi 3D version. In addition, Fighter has sold 10,119 tickets in the Hindi IMAX 3D version. The film features Hrithik Roshan as Squadron Leader Shamsher Pathania aka Patty, and Deepika Padukone as Squadron Leader Minal Rathore aka Mini. This is the first time that Hrithik and Deepika are collaborating on-screen. Apart from the two, the movie also features Anil Kapoor, Sanjeeda Sheikh, Karan Singh Grover, Akshay Oberoi, Talat Aziz, and Aamir Naik in important roles.
In a new development, Fighter, which revolves around an Indian Air Force squad on a mission to protect the nation, will not be released in Gulf countries except the United Arab Emirates. On Thursday, sources confirmed that the film has failed to receive approval from the GCC Censors [Gulf Cooperation Council Censors]. The censor screening took place on January 10 and the denial for release was only shared on January 23. The big news was also confirmed by trade analyst Girish Johar. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), the trade analyst called the development a major setback and wrote, “In a setback, #Fighter officially banned across Middle East regions for theatrical release. Only UAE will release the film with a PG15 classification!”
Meanwhile, during a press conference ahead of the release, Hrithik Roshan shared his experience of working with Deepika Padukone for the first time. Explaining how Deepika helped him during the filming of the hit track Sher Khul Gaye, Hrithik said, “There is a thing that helped me a lot, this is when we were shooting for Sher Khul Gaye. I had obviously put in a lot of effort in getting the steps right but when I saw Deepika doing the same step, I was like this is looking so effortless man and then I asked Deepika, 'Can you please do the step for me'. We are on set, the camera is on and I was like, I am not doing it until I understand what is going wrong with my step. So I asked her to do the step, I saw what she was doing and then I copied what her style was.”
Fighter has been backed by Viacom18 Studios and Marflix Pictures.