The chaos of May 14 is already looking like a footnote. Karuppu, which couldn’t get its morning shows off the ground on its original release date due to a financial crisis at Dream Warrior Pictures, has crossed ₹10 crore in real-time gross at the Tamil Nadu box office as of 8:24 PM on Friday — and trade trackers are now pointing at a ₹30 crore-plus worldwide opening.
That is a significant number for a film that lost an entire day of release.
According to Sacnilk, Karuppu was selling nearly 39,000 tickets per hour on BookMyShow for the Tamil version alone, with over 200,000 tickets sold on the platform on May 15 with half the day still remaining. Sacnilk projects the film to score in the range of ₹20 crore gross at the domestic box office — which would rank among Suriya’s biggest-ever openings.
By 4 PM on Friday, Karuppu had earned ₹5 crore gross in Tamil Nadu alone. Kerala had crossed ₹1.08 crore by 5 PM. Telugu states contributed ₹1.51 crore by 4:30 PM.
A Disrupted Start That Didn’t Stick
Final advance booking for Day 1 stood at ₹4.55 crore gross at the Indian box office — ₹1.85 crore from Tamil Nadu, ₹1.22 crore from Telugu states, ₹71 lakh from Kerala, and ₹69 lakh from Karnataka. A chunk of that went into refunds after the May 14 shows were cancelled, making Friday’s recovery all the more pointed.
The film is running across 3,474 shows in India, with early estimates putting Day 1 net collection at ₹5.88 crore and India gross at ₹6.94 crore. Saturday advance is already looking strong — Day 2 advance bookings stand at ₹4.55 crore across 5,184 shows in 1,243 theatres spanning 513 cities.
In the opening credits, the makers extended their “sincere thanks” to Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Vijay in a special title card — and when his name appeared on screen, theatres reportedly erupted. The film that thanked CM Vijay for the 9 AM shows ended up not using them on Day 1. By Day 2, it may not need them.
Trade handle Friday Matinee has projected a Tamil Nadu theatrical share of over ₹50 crore for Karuppu’s full run — a projection, not a confirmed figure, but one that reflects how quickly sentiment has shifted since Wednesday’s release-day meltdown.
The weekend will tell the real story. With Saturday advance already loaded and positive word-of-mouth driving spot bookings, Karuppu’s opening weekend numbers could quietly reframe the entire narrative around this film’s troubled birth.
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