Bollywood Disaster Movie Jaani Dushman: Whenever it comes to flop films of Bollywood, the names of ‘Bade Miyan Chhote Miyan’, ‘Thugs of Hindostan’, ‘Zero’, ‘Lal Singh Chaddha’ and ‘Sikander’ are definitely taken. But apart from these films, there is one more film which is considered to be the biggest flop of Bollywood. We are talking about the most expensive movie of 2002, ‘Jaani Dushman’, which was directed by Rajkumar Kohli. The supernatural thriller ‘Jaani Dushman: Ek Anokhi Kahani’ was a multi-starrer movie from which the audience had high expectations. But the film proved to be a worse flop at the box office than the expectations from it.
‘Jaani Dushman: Ek Anokhi Kahani’, released in 2002, was one of the most anticipated multi-starrer films of Bollywood. Many big stars including Sunny Deol, Akshay Kumar, Sunil Shetty, Armaan Kohli, Arshad Warsi, Aftab Shivdasani, Sonu Nigam and Manisha Koirala were seen in the film. At that time, bringing together such a big star cast was a big thing in itself, but after the release, the condition of the film was very bad.
Bollywood’s most disaster movie
‘Jaani Dushman’, released on 16 August 2002, featured stars like Akshay Kumar, Sunil Shetty, Armaan Kohli, Sunny Deol, Sonu Nigam, Manisha Koirala, Arshad Warsi, Aftab Shivdasani, Johnny Lever, Raj Babbar, Amrish Puri, Upasana Singh and Rajat Bedi. According to reports, 58 huge sets were built for the film and at that time around Rs 5 crore were spent only on visual effects (VFX), which was considered a huge amount in the early 2000s.
Jaani Dushman’s budget and collection
The budget of ‘Jaani Dushman’ was also very big for that time, but the audience did not particularly like its story and VFX. The result was that the film could not even recover its costs. About Rs 18 crores were spent in making ‘Jaani Dushman’ and it earned only Rs 19 crores at the worldwide box office. With this, this film joined the list of disaster films of Bollywood.
Today is a cult classic
However, with time ‘Jaani Dushman’ got a different kind of fan base. Many scenes and dialogues of the film started going viral on TV and internet. Today this film is considered a cult film due to its over-the-top story, VFX and multi-starrer cast. Many viewers like to watch it again for entertainment.
The director distanced himself from films
This film was directed by veteran filmmaker Rajkumar Kohli. This proved to be the last directorial film of Rajkumar Kohli, famous for hit films like ‘Nagin’, ‘Jaani Dushman’ (1979) and ‘Naukar Biwi Ka’. After the flop of ‘Jaani Dushman: Ek Anokhi Kahani’, he did not direct any new film and distanced himself from filmmaking. The interesting thing is that this film, which was a disaster at the box office, is today counted among the most popular cult disaster films of Bollywood.
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