Spider-Man: Brand New Day rewrites Hollywood's box office game in India

Spider-Man: Brand New Day has crossed Rs 500 crore gross in India and is still adding to its tally in its third week. The Tom Holland-starrer has collected an estimated Rs 457.45 crore net and Rs 546.92 crore gross in India after 17 days. On Day 17, the film added Rs 10.15 crore net, taking its third-weekend run back up after a drop on Friday.The film opened in India on July 30, a day before its global release, and has overtaken Avatar: The Way of Water to become the highest-grossing Hollywood film in the country. The film has already earned over $2 billion worldwide in three weeks, becoming the second film after Avengers: Endgame to achieve this milestone. Endgame entered the $2 billion club in 11 days.For Shony Panjikaran, General Manager & Head, Sony Pictures Releasing International, India, the response to the film in India was bigger than expected, even though the team knew the Spider-Man franchise had a strong following in the country. “When we saw the film, we knew we have a wonderful film in our hands. Obviously, we know how big Spider-Man is in the world and especially in our market. Indians just love Spider-Man and they love Tom Holland,” Panjikaran told India Today.“We knew we were going to be the number one Hollywood film of all time when we saw the film. We knew this is going to be the number one. But to be number one in 11 days and still a long way to go, it’s just less than two weeks and we have already broken that record,” Shony said. The premium format pushThe film’s India release covered approximately 5,300 screens, according to Panjikaran. The release also put considerable focus on premium formats at a time when IMAX was not available in India during the initial phase.“When it’s a good film, then people will consume it,” he said, explaining the thinking behind the premium-format strategy. “Obviously our thing was to give it in the biggest screens possible,” he added. Panjikaran revealed that the team worked with exhibitors to increase awareness around Premium Large Format, or PLF, screens, adding, “People were not aware of it. We worked very closely with our exhibitor partners.”According to him, India had more than 60 PLF screens, apart from IMAX, and around 35 4DX screens. Together, that was close to 100 premium-format screens. Against the film’s roughly 5,300-screen footprint, these premium formats represented about 2 per cent of the screens, but Panjikaran said they had contributed more than 8 per cent of the business at the time of the interview. "The point is that 2 per cent contributing to anything more than 5 per cent is quite significant," Panjikaran said.The film’s ticket pricing also went well beyond the standard theatrical range. Ahead of release, premium tickets in Delhi-NCR were reported to have reached Rs 2,800, while select Mumbai tickets touched Rs 2,700. Panjikaran said the response challenges the idea that Indian audiences will not spend on theatrical tickets."We are price sensitive to stuff which is not worth the money, is my personal opinion, but we are ready to spend anything if we feel we’re getting the right product for it or the right movie for it," he said.How six languages changed the audience mixSpider-Man: Brand New Day was released in English, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada in India. Panjikaran said English accounted for approximately 53 per cent of the business at the time of the interview, while Hindi contributed 34-35 per cent. Tamil and Telugu were around 5 per cent each, with Malayalam and Kannada together contributing approximately 1 per cent.The latest available India figures through Day 17 put the language collections at Rs 250.6 crore net for English, Rs 166.5 crore for Hindi, Rs 24.1 crore for Tamil, Rs 16.5 crore for Telugu, Rs 48 lakh for Malayalam and Rs 32 lakh for Kannada.Panjikaran highlighted the Hindi performance in particular. “We have seen great growth in this film. It’s contributed to about 34, 35 per cent, which is pretty huge,” he said, adding, “The occupancies of Hindi also are very, very good. Right from day one till yesterday we have been seeing that Hindi has been, in terms of the occupancies, fantastic.” The decision to release the film in multiple Indian languages, Panjikaran explained, was not made only with revenue in mind. He said, “Our intention was just not to make additional money. We just wanted to ensure that everyone gets the option of watching it in the language which they want to watch it.”Panjikaran pointed to Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, which was dubbed into 10 Indian languages, as an earlier example. He said, “We knew maybe some languages we won’t make money, so money was not the criteria even for Spider-Man. We just wanted to give that option.”The response could lead to an even wider language release for the franchise. “If the market reacts well, then the next Spider-Man maybe we could do 20 languages,” he added. Hollywood and Indian cinema share the same box-office spacePanjikaran said the performance of Brand New Day is part of a wider change in the Indian theatrical market, where audiences are increasingly watching films regardless of where they originate.“With this film and a few of the past films which you have seen in the past one year, we’ve seen that now we are in the same realm as the bigger Indian films,” he said. He highlighted that the film’s opening weekend was also among the biggest for an Indian film, adding, “That’s great for cinema. It’s just not about Hollywood or Hindi or Tamil or Telugu, whichever.”He described Indian audiences as increasingly “language agnostic”. “Wherever the good product comes from, we are like kind of lapping it up,” he said.Shony cited Demon Slayer as another example. The anime film, according to Panjikaran, was initially expected to have a ceiling of around Rs 15 crore in India but eventually made around Rs 90 crore. “We did a big push for that,” he said, adding, “I think it’s what culturally resonates with India and where the right, like you said, the emotions are there.” Where does Spider-Man go from here?When asked where Brand New Day could eventually finish in India, Panjikaran did not put a figure on it.“We don’t have a target. Right now, we’re seeing there’s no ceiling,” he said, adding that exhibitors were also expecting the film to have a long run.“We are very, very bullish, and I don’t want to give a number because I will be proved wrong. So, I think it can go anywhere,” Panjikaran said.The film has since moved to Rs 546.92 crore gross and Rs 457.45 crore net after 17 days. Its third Saturday collection of Rs 10.15 crore came after the film dropped to Rs 3.90 crore on its third Friday, when Awarapan 2 opened in cinemas.Panjikaran’s assessment of what the Indian market can deliver is straightforward. “If you’ve got the right product with the right kind of emotions in the film when we have the right product and with the right emotions, then sky is the limit,” he concluded.For Spider-Man: Brand New Day, the India gross currently stands at Rs 546.92 crore and counting.- EndsPublished By: Anurag BohraPublished On: Aug 17, 2026 16:50 IST