After the men in Once Upon A Time In Mumbaai last week, the women in Aisha are in the focus of limelight this week. As expected, the film didn’t have a grand opening. Having an average start, it was supposed to manage to scrape through at least. The opening of a new movie is always expected to hover around the 50% mark and this is what happened with Aisha on the day of its release at multiplexes in major cities like Delhi, Mumbai, and Bangalore.

In a way, this was fair since the film was never designed for B and C centres and hence, minimal collections from these places didn’t surprise at all. In fact, what would actually be a surprise is if the film manages to stay on in these centres in the second week. Reason being that even in metros, the film has elicited mixed response from cine goers. Though no one has either thrashed the film or called it excellent, the word of mouth has ranged from below average to good.

Due to this, Aisha made on a shoe-stringed budget managed to bag a collection of approximately 13 crores over the first weekend, which is good enough to keep it afloat. Had the word of mouth been very positive, the movie would have seen a healthy start as there is no competition for Aisha other than Once Upon A Time In Mumbaai which is still finding patronage in the second week. However, since audience hasn’t overtly lapped up Aisha, there is possibility of a fall in the industry standard of 50% in its second week.

What disappointed audience is the fact that ‘Aisha’ begins as a crackling chick flick with dollops of comedy but hardly managed to stand on its feet in the second hour. Though there are a few redeeming moments in this half too, they are far and few. Also, the concluding 20 minutes take the film totally downhill which is extremely disappointing, though at the beginning, Aisha promises to deliver a lot.

All in all, the film won’t result in a red at the box office but won’t quite touch the heights that Sonam’s last hit I Hate Luv Storys did.

– Sampurn Wire