Seems like Tamil fans of the movie "Premam" are not ready to say goodbye to the Nivin Pauly-starrer. The film, which was expected to be taken off Escape Cinemas, the last Chennai theatre it was running in, is on its way to make history. Despite many big-budget Pongal Tamil releases, the Alphonse Puthren directorial continues its historic run at the Chennai box office even after 230 days — or nearly eight months — of release.
As of 13 January, "Premam" was not listed on the Escape Cinemas' website for the coming week, and Wednesday was said to be the last day of the movie's screening in Chennai. After the news broke, fans went into a frenzy to book tickets for the last screening, leading to yet another houseful show of the movie. Owing to this demand for the movie, its screening has now been extended by another week at Escape Cinemas in Chennai, as currently listed on the multiplex's website.
On its 231st day, "Premam" was screened at 12:15 pm and would be screened again at 7:15 pm at Escape Carve from 15 to 21 January. "#Premam is unstoppable, will continue at @SPIcinemas 's #Escape, inspite of new Pongal releases, (sic)" tweeted trade analyst Sreedhar Pillai.
"Premam", released on 29 May, 2015, is the first Malayalam movie that enjoyed a historic run of more than 200 days in Chennai even though it ran for only 125 days in Kerala, showing Nivin's huge fan following in Tamil Nadu. Even actors like Sai Pallavi, Madonna Sebastian, Anupama Parameshwaran and Vinay Forrt now enjoy a huge fan base in the state.
Many fans as well as celebrities have, meanwhile, requested other moviemakers not to remake the blockbuster film in Tamil as they have fallen in love with the original.
Nivin Pauly watches Premam with Chennai fans on 222nd day
The film's Telugu remake "Majnu" will be released later this year. It stars Naga Chaitanya (in Nivin's role George), Anupama Parameshwaran, Shruti Haasan (in Sai's role Malar) and Amyra Dastur (in Madonna's role Celine). After Shruti's photos from the shooting location were leaked online, fans began expressing their dissatisfaction with the casting. ‪"Shruthi Haasan‬ to act as Malar in Tamil version, but she is not going to be as gud as ‪Sai Pallavi (sic)", a social media user said in response to Shruti's photos, which went viral.
