Aamir Khan's Romance With Audience In China Turns Sour After His Film's Release

Aamir Khan's popularity in China seems to be fading after the film Thugs of Hindostan hits the Chinese movie market. A reality check has been carried out, and it has received apathetic responses from the audience as well as critics in this country. The film's release date was on Friday. However, until Thursday, the revenue has reached less than $8 million, which is not as high as expected.

The film's flop shows Indian directors and producers the fact that Indian films still need a real storyline. Their films will be more successful if the storyline can connect and touch the audience's feelings. Maybe that's the reasons why Khan’s Dhoom 3 failed to attract attention from the Chinese audience when it hit the screen in 2014. Nevertheless, several movies like 3 Idiots, Dangal and Secret Superstar still gained the audience's affection.

Failure of Thugs of Hindostan is not due to the lack of Khan's part trying to popularise the film in China. The star arrived in China nearly two weeks before the film's release. He also made a tour around cities to advertise his movie.

An article in Global Times wrote “From South to North, from East to West, he had visited a number of key Chinese cities including Guangzhou, Xi’an, Nanjing and Shanghai. He even spent Christmas Eve with Chinese moviegoers for the movie’s Chinese premiere. He used various ways from taking selfies with fans to showing his Chinese handicrafts to please Chinese audiences,”

Reviews from Chinese audience on Thugs of Hindostan

According to a report, the film received critical comments on Chinese film websites. On Douban and Mtime, the film got the lowest rating with only 6.2. Some viewers who rated this film solely 1 star in 5 claimed that the movie wasted them a lot of time. Some said that how could the Indian director expect Chinese to love the film while even Indians didn't like it. Also, they thought that it is just an imitative version of the franchise Pirates of the Caribbean.

“He (Aamir Khan) couldn’t save the fate of such a bad movie with his fame," said an anonymous film critic. Because of not having a wide knowledge of Indian history, the Chinese audience will find it hard to echo in some parts of the film. Moreover, information about a bad reputation in this country also influences the audience.

However, there are still some viewpoints which are not entirely negative. A veteran Douban reviewer and blogger Wuya Huotang posted a review on Douban and WeChat. She wrote that the film is not completely a failure. "He attributed the extreme low grades on IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes to the sites’ large number of Indian moviegoers, who prefer to see straightforward battles between a hero and a villain instead of Khan’s role in Thugs of Hindostan, which switches back and forth between hero and villain,”