Airlift is rounding the corner of one more week of box office dominance.  It’s possible that Ghayal Once Again or Sanam Teri Kasam may come up to challenge it but I doubt it.  On the other hand, Fitoor is definitely going to knock it out of theaters next weekend.  So, really, we are in the homestretch and can start making final box office estimates.

The most important of these is how Airlift did in comparison with Dilwale.  Airlift has already rounded most of Akshay’s benchmarks, and Akshay is second only to the Khans in box office power, so now the question is, can he topple the lowest hanging fruit of the Khan blockbusters?  And, more generally, can he compete with the second most successful film of recent weeks (first most successful overseas)?

Let’s go to the numbers!  Airlift is at 192.79 crore worldwide.  And only 35.19 globally.  Whereas Dilwale made 172.8 crore.  However, back home, Dilwale bottomed out at 214.73 crore.  So, Dilwale is ridiculously ahead in overseas box office, but they are getting closer and closer with India only figures.

Airlift has been slowly dropping, is down to maybe 2 crore a day in India only, with a slight boost on weekends.  But still, it’s got 7 days left before Fitoor, that’s 14 crore at a low estimate.  And maybe it keeps running in a few more theaters for another week or so at about 1 crore a day.  It only needs 22 crore to beat Dilwale, so it is looking likely!  Good on you Akshay!  From what I can tell, he hasn’t beaten a Khan blockbuster (I’m not talking about like Talaash, just the real blockbuster films) since Phir Hera Pheri came out back in 2006 and beat Don (another film that did shockingly well overseas, but less than expected back home).