Hindi
Cricket movie brings in the moolah
MUMBAI: There have been a few biopics made earlier on sport personalities, most with tepid reception with, may be, a couple of them making an impact and sustain at the box office. However, cricket has no barrier between audiences as it enjoys universal following.
To add to the delight of the lovers of cricket, M S Dhoni: The Untold Story tells about the struggles of an aspiring cricketer from a small town middleclass India, M S Dhoni, who went to lead the Indian cricket team on the path of glory. The combination proved just the recipe to draw the viewers. Cricket and Dhoni lovers alike took to the film instantly overlooking all its flaws.
M S Dhoni: The Untold Story opened to an excellent response all over befitting a regular commercial star cast film. The film collected about Rs 20 crore on day one, sustained very well on Saturday with a negligible drop but held on very well on Sunday. Being a solo release after a deluge of mediocre and poor films also helped its cause. The film collected Rs 61.6crore for its opening weekend.
However, the film has shown a noticeable drop today (Monday), especially at single screens. The film was exempt from entertainment tax in UP (200 screens over two months) which may utilized next Friday onwards. Tax exemption is also expected from Delhi government soon.
While the collections match the appreciation the film has earned, the film faces a massive challenge for the status of a commercial success is its huge price tag.
*Banjo, a film about a gully bred Banjo player, suffered due to its outright regional Marathi flavor; the musical instrument as well as the flavor, both lacking all India identity.
However, what this purported musical lacked the most was what it needed the most, music. The film lacked grossly in popular songs. The film met with rejection on the very onset. Having met with a poor response and collecting a mere Rs 4.45 crore for its opening weekend, the film continued with its poor run through the week to collect Rs 7.6 crore for its first week.
*Parched will have to remain contended with the festival circuit as the film has not been able to make an impact at the box office. The film managed just Rs 1.2 crore for its first week.
*Days OfTafree: In Class, Out Of Class, a remake of the Gujarati film, Chhello Divas, goes overboard with its theme of college campus fun, as it depicts the fun few would identify with. The film collected Rs 1.75 crore in its first week.
*DilSala Sanki and Chapekar Brothers fail miserably at the box office.
*Pink makes the most of poor oppositions in its second week and sustains with excellent collections of Rs 22.4 crore to take its two week total to Rs 57.9 crore.
*Raaz: Reboot collets 1.35 crore in its second week taking its two week tally to Rs 24.05 crore.
Hindi
Remembering Gyan Sahay, the lens behind film, television and advertising
From a puppet rabbit selling poppadums to Hindi cinema, he framed it all.
MUMBAI: There are careers, and then there are canvases. Gyan Sahay, the veteran cinematographer, director, and producer who passed away on 10 March 2026 in Mumbai, had one of the latter. Over several decades in the Indian film and television industry, he turned lenses, lights, and the occasional puppet rabbit into something approaching art.
A graduate of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune, Sahay built his reputation as a director of photography across a career that stretched from the early 1970s all the way to the digital age. He was the kind of craftsman who understood that a well-composed shot is not merely a technical achievement but a quiet act of storytelling.
For most Indians of a certain age, however, Sahay will forever be the man behind the rabbit. His direction of the iconic long-running television commercial for Lijjat Papad, featuring its now-legendary puppet bunny, gave the country one of its most cheerfully persistent advertising images. It was the sort of work that sneaks into the national subconscious and takes up permanent residence.
His big-screen credits as cinematographer include Anokhi Pehchan (1972), Pagli (1974), Pas de Deux (1981), and Hum Farishte Nahin (1988). In 1999, he stepped behind a different kind of camera altogether, making his directorial debut with Sar Ankhon Par, a drama that featured Vikas Bhalla and Shruti Ulfat, with a cameo by Shah Rukh Khan for good measure.
On television, Sahay was particularly prized for his command of multi-camera production setups, a skill that made him a go-to technician for large-scale shows and reality programmes. In an industry that has never been especially patient with complexity, he was the calm hand on the rig.
In later life, Sahay turned teacher. He participated regularly in masterclasses and Digi-Talks, often hosted by organisations such as Bharatiya Chitra Sadhna, sharing hard-won wisdom on cinematography, the comedy of timing in a shot, and the sweeping changes brought by the shift from celluloid to digital. He was also said to have been involved in a project concerning a biographical film on Infosys co-founder N.R. Narayana Murthy.
Tributes from the film industry poured in following the news of his passing, with colleagues remembering him as a senior cameraman who served as a rare bridge between two entirely different eras of Indian cinema. That is, perhaps, the finest thing one can say of any craftsman: he kept up, and he brought others along with him.
