EXCLUSIVE Box Office Prediction: What will be the opening weekend collection of Saif Ali Khan's Chef? Trade Experts reveal

Here's what trade experts have to say about Saif Ali Khan's film Chef's box office collections.

Written by Karishma Shetty , Journalist

Updated on Oct 18, 2017 | 12:19 PM IST | 382.5K

Saif Ali Khan is all set to win our hearts as a father who tries to mend his broken relationship with his son through food, in the light-hearted Raja Krishna Menon directorial, Chef.

Along with Saif, is an extremely diverse cast comprising of Svar Kamble, Padmapriya Dinesh Prabhakar, Chandan Roy Sanyal and Milind Soman. Chef is the Hindi adaptation of the 2014 Hollywood movie by the same name which then starred Jon Favreau, Emjay Anthony, Sofia Vergara, Robert Downey Jr. and Scarlett Johansson.

While the trailer and songs have resonated with the audience, one will have to wait till Friday to see how the movie will perform at the box office.

We got in touch with some trade experts who gave us their box office predictions for the opening day and first weekend collections of Saif's Chef:

Akshaye Rathi (Trade Analyst): "Going by the way Chef has been promoted and the kind of hype and hysteria that has been generated around it, I don't expect a massive opening for this film. But at least, going by the genre, the kind of film it is, the fact that it is the remake of a fantastic film and the way it is set up, I really think that Chef will substantially grow with a word of mouth. It is one of those films that will have to be nurtured and grown after it releases rather than expecting it to open with a bang and then phislao. The opening day may fetch the movie between INR 4-5 crore and a weekend of around INR 12-15 crore, perhaps. After that, I see great sustenance in this film."

Girish Johar (Film Trade Analyst): "I'm expecting for Chef to open around INR 4 crore. If the word of mouth is good; which I am getting a very positive feedback from the initial trial shows, the weekend should be around INR 15 crore. That is if the word of mouth properly takes place. If the content is good and the word of mouth is strong, it can touch to INR 15 crore."

Atul Mohan (Trade Analyst): "October 6 was actually going to see the releases of 2-3 films which included Chef, Julie 2 and Aksar 2. Due to some reason, the other movies had to reschedule their release dates. Hence, Chef is the main solo release of this week. If we go by the promos as well as the songs of the movie, Chef looks like it is for an upper-class audience. It's for the metro cities and will do best in Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad, Bangalore and Chennai. I think Day 1 for Chef will see the collections at INR 4-4.5 crore. The response that the film has carried till now from those who have watched it, has been from very good to excellent. If the reviews are good. The weekend may stand between INR 12-15 crore. It completely depends on the content of Chef."