Srinu Vaitla's Amar Akbar Anthony (Antony/AAA) has opened to an average response at the US box office in the premiere shows and has failed to beat the collections of Ravi Teja's Touch Chesi Chudu (TCC).
US is one of the key markets for Telugu movies, but Ravi Teja has failed to exploit it to fullest extent. Since he joined hands with Mythri Movie Makers, which has made its mark in the US box office, it was thought that Amar Akbar Anthony would get a big break to mass maharaja, besides amassing a huge amount of fans across the country. The hype helped the makers sell its overseas rights for Rs 1.60 crore.
The distributors premiered Amar Akbar Anthony in around 110 screens across the US on Thursday. They had made decent promotion for the Srinu Vaitla-directed film, but it could not translate into good advance booking for the preview shows, which ended up witnessing an average amount of footfalls.
As per early updates, Amar Akbar Anthony has collected $57,848 from 86 locations at the US box office in the premiere shows. PaniPuri, which often gives early updates on US collections, tweeted, "#AmarAkbarAnthony #USA Premieres Gross till 11PM CST $57,848 From 86 Locs.. #RaviTeja #ileana #IleanaDcruz"
Raja The Great, which collected $117,400 from 90 screens in the US premiere shows, is the biggest opener for Ravi Teja. The actor had two releases like Touch Chesi Chudu and Nela ticket earlier this year, but they failed to beat this record, as they collected $71,409 and $32,280, respectively at the US box office in their premiere shows. Now, Amar Akbar Anthony fell short of beating Touch Chesi Chudu.
Amar Akbar Anthony has received negative response from the US audience, who say that Srinu Vaitla has picked up a good subject, but failed to execute it in a convincing way. They add that lead actor's performances and good production values are saving graces of the film. However, the word of mouth is likely to take a toll on its collection in the coming days and it may incur losses to its distributors.