2024 has been a different year for big-scale action movies, as they haven’t had the same box office impact as in previous years. This decline can be attributed to “action fatigue,” but there are also several other factors contributing to the shift.
Unlike 2024, the year 2023 was mostly dominated by macho men taking on the bad guys and beating them to a pulp whether it was Jawan, Gadar 2 or Animal.
2024 has been a different year for big-scale action movies, as they haven’t had the same box office impact as in previous years. This decline can be attributed to “action fatigue,” but there are also several other factors contributing to the shift.
For example, in Devara, a simplistic story was dragged out, testing the viewer’s patience. The movie majorly rode on Junior NTR’s double role and to an extent on Saif Ali Khan’s villainous avatar.
Both actors were wonderful in their respective parts as was the technical department but Koratala Siva’s attempt to have his own Baahubali moment made it just about an average watch.
Suriya made his big screen comeback after a long gap with Kanguva, however, the movie turned out to be a disastrous experience relying purely on the big scale and Suriya to do wonders. Not surprisingly the movie turned out to be a box office turkey leaving a big dent in the producer’s pockets.
Now let’s get into a little more detail about some of the underperforming big-scale action movies.
Fighter
Siddharth Anand’s Fighter had all the ingredients of a mega-blockbuster, including big stars like Hrithik Roshan, Deepika and Anil Kapoor. It also had a charismatic Hrithik Roshan coupled with some fantastic Ariel stunts.
Following the success of his previous ventures, War (2019), and Pathaan, Siddharth Anand incorporated the typical elements of patriotism. However, the film suffered majorly from clichéd troupes involving India and Pakistan.
Lines about the real meaning of religion and patriotism had a jaded feel pulling down the movie significantly. Fighter is by no means a complete disaster, still, the film fell majorly short compared to Siddharth Anand’s last two action movies.
Jigra
Vasan Bala is known for his unique brand of storytelling. This time he tried his hand at the action genre with an emotional story of an elder sister’s fight.
The director is known for a certain sense of aesthetics. His movies have a Korean touch, something which Jigra also had in its depiction of the fictional country Hanshi Dao.
Jigra was an extremely well-made movie spearheaded by a brilliant Alia Bhatt, yet, the film underperformed as the mass belt didn’t take to the movie much due to its Korean aesthetics.
Singham Again
Rohit Shetty’s Singham Again had a galaxy of stars and a genre in which Rohit has succeeded. But something was majorly off with the movie starting from the long trailer revealing the major parallels with Ramayana along with the character introductions. The result was pretty much a disaster.
Too much time was wasted, introducing the Ramayana parallels and the action sequences were a tired rehash of Rohit Shetty’s previous movies.
The film clashed with Anees Bazmee’s Bhool Bhulaiyaa 3 headlined by Kartik Aaryan, and the latter won at the box office.
Bade Miyan Chote Miyan
Just like 2023, 2024 was also a disappointing year for Akshay Kumar. Bade Miyan Chote Miyan was especially disappointing.
This Ali Abbas Zafar’s directorial had the pet themes of mainstream Hindi Cinema. A deadly enemy wanting to cause harm to the nation and two brave-hearted soldiers tackling the nemesis.
The genre of Bade Miyan Chote Miyan is a cakewalk for Akshay, given his image as a Khiladi but the movie bombed badly in spite of Ali Abbas Zafar’s impressive commercial track record.
A major problem with Bade Miya Chote Miyan, apart from a tedious Akshay was its simplistic portrayal of complex political scenarios.
The solutions were oversimplified lacking the nuances needed. After a point, the movie just became a stretch of one action sequence after another.
Yodha
Since the success of the Vikram Batra biopic Shershaah (2021) on Amazon Prime, Sidharth Malhotra has been deliberately choosing characters of a patriotic nature. Still, the results have been far from satisfactory.
Yodha directed by Pushkar Ojha and Sagar Ambre despite being a slick action movie with a very watchable Sidharth Malhotra couldn’t do much at the box office.
A major reason for that was the underdeveloped love story between Sidharth and Rashi Khanna’s characters. The emotional drama of the story needed more heft. The movie also suffered from predictability and the typical elements of this genre.
Guntur Kaaram
Reputed filmmaker Trivikram Srinivas’s Guntur Kaaram was a mix of his usual family drama with the general template of action, romance and comedy.
The pet theme of Trivikram on how the greatest battles are fought with the people closest to you reached a saturation point with this one. Mahesh Babu was a lot of fun to watch with his comic timing and his Guntur dialect.
There was a refreshing carefree nature which the actor nailed. But the movie on the whole was a big bloated mess. Even the scenes of Mahesh Babu punching the baddies couldn’t save this festive movie.
The action scenes were the standard hero elevation shots, which had moments of Trivikram Srinivas’s trademark humour but that wasn’t enough to salvage the proceedings.
The Sankranthi release clashed with Nagarjuna’s Naa Saami Ranga, Venkatesh’s Saindhav, and Prashant Varma and Teja Sajja’s Hanu-man.
With the right mix of mythology and superhero elements, Hanu-man emerged as the clear winner among all the big Sankranti releases.
Bharateeyudu 2/ Indian 2
S Shankar’s vigilante action drama Bharateeyudu 2/ Indian 2 had none of the emotional complexities of the 1996 blockbuster Bharateeyudu/ Indian.
The movie was a typical Shankar lecture on how corruption should be uprooted. It had long drawn speeches testing the viewer’s patience.
Bharateeyudu 2/ Indian 2 showed that S Shankar’s cinematic language needs a major changeover. For most of the movie, Kamal Hassan is presented as an unbeatable superhero.
His interactions with the bad guys and how he easily beats them to a pulp were embarrassing, to say the least.
Saindhav
Venketash’s 75th movie Saindhav was a deliberate attempt from the actor to mix the elements of the family dramas he is known for with bone-crushing action. The film had shades of Lokesh Kangaraj’s Leo —a family man with a violent past.
Saindhav had all the elements of a solid action drama with Venketash delivering a commendable performance both in the action parts as well as the emotional sequences.
But the movie overall didn’t hit the mark because of too much dependence on the scale. The screenplay was extremely uneven. Also, it lacked a solid antagonist. Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s eccentric villain was a pain to watch.
This is all about the underperformance of some big action movies. Clearly, certain exhaustion has set in the viewers’ minds regarding this genre.
This partly explains the tremendous success of the horror comedy/thriller genre as it is giving more exciting storylines.
(Edited by Sumavarsha Kandula)
