Female-led films have usually found it hard to do big business at the box office. Only a few, like Arundhati and Mahanati, managed to succeed. These films showed that audiences will watch movies led by women if the story and production are strong.
The latest example is Lokah Chapter 1: Chandra, a malayalam film, starring Kalyani Priyadarshan. The film is directed by Dominic Arun and produced by Dulquer Salmaan’s Wayfarer Films. It released last week and is performing very well. In just six days, Lokah earned about ₹90 crore worldwide. This is more than the lifetime collections of Mahanati (around ₹85 crore) and Rudhrama Devi (around ₹80 crore). It has now become the highest-grossing female-led film from South India.
The film’s success is notable because it was made on a budget over ₹30 crores. The visuals and scale feel much bigger, and the superhero story is connecting with audiences. The movie is doing well in Telugu states, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala. The Hindi version will release this week. The film is expected to cross ₹100 crore in the first week and may enter the ₹200 crore club soon.
Lokah Chapter 1 is also the first part of a planned five-part series. The director said that stories for all five films were ready before shooting the first one. This makes the franchise interesting and shows the growing trend of multi-part cinematic universes in India.
The success of Lokah shows that female-led superhero films can attract large audiences when the story and production are good. It sets a new benchmark for this kind of film. Fans are also looking forward to other films in this category. One of them is Anushka Shetty’s Ghaati, which will release on September 5. It will be interesting to see if it can match this success.
Related