Director Girish AD's age gap romance Bethlehem Kudumba Unit, starring Nivin Pauly and Mamitha Baiju, has earned more than 250 crore from theatres worldwide in 16 days of its release. It has become the second-fastest to the milestone, the first one being Prithviraj Sukumaran-Mohanlal's L2: Empuraan. With Dulquer Salmaan's I'm Game receiving mixed response and with the Nivin film releasing in other languages, the buzz within the industry and the audience is that BKU is well on its way to becoming the highest-grossing Malayalam film of all time. It is Nivin's first film to cross the 250-crore mark.
Lokah Chapter One: Chandra still remains the industry hit in Malayalam cinema in terms of worldwide box office collection. However, trade analysts expect the Nivin Pauly starrer to overcome the global collection of the Kalyani Priyadarshan headliner.
Earlier this year, Vaazha 2: Biopic of a Billion Bros became the highest-grossing Malayalam film at the Kerala box office.
Bethlehem Kudumba Unit has surpassed the worldwide gross collection of Vaazha 2: Biopic of a Billion Bros and is expected to become the new industry hit at the Kerala box office as well. Even on Saturday, the 16th day of its release, the film earned a net collection of 5.65 crore from theatres in India, according to data from Sacnilk. For context, the Bethlehem Kudumba Unit box office collection in India for Saturday is more as compared to the corresponding figure for I'm Game. The number of shows in India has also remained steady for the Nivin Pauly film on Saturday, with Sacnilk reporting 1,834 shows.
Even on the 16th day, the majority of the gross collection for the film came from its Malayalam version. While the Tamil version earned 1.05 on Saturday, according to Sacnilk, the Malayalam original minted 5.70 crore from theatres.
