‘Dangal’ wrestles its way into hearts of Chinese moviegoers
MUMBAI: A Bollywood film about a father who trains his daughters to become world-class wrestlers has broken a box office record in China, where its focus on feminism and tough love has resonated with audiences.
Dangal has raked in 776 million yuan (RM493 million) since it opened on May 5, official data showed on Monday. Box office monitoring site mtime.com says this makes it the highestgrossing non-Hollywood foreign film in China.
Universal’s The Fate of the Furious holds the box office record in China for any film, raking in 2.7 billion yuan in receipts since its debut on Apr 14.
The Indian movie, directed by Nitesh Tiwari, is based on the true story of wrestling coach Mahavir Singh Phogat, who defies the odds by raising his daughters Geeta and Babita Phogat to become champion wrestlers.
Geeta won a gold medal for India at the 2010 Commonwealth Games while her sister topped the podium at the same event in 2014.
Dangal is a Hindi word used to describe a wrestling competition. In Chinese the film’s name has been translated into Let’s Wrestle, Dad.
The movie was released in India on Dec 23 last year and quickly became the highestgrossing Bollywood film of all time, beating the 2014 science fiction film PK.
Dangal is believed to have made around US$233 million (RM1.02 billion) in worldwide box office sales, according to industry estimates.