Hansal Mehta’s Simran, which released yesterday. got a decent opening at the box-office. The film starring Kangana Ranaut in the title role collected Rs. 2.77 crore. In the film, Kangana plays a Gujarati divorcee, Praful Patel, who lives in New York.

Mehta, who directed films like City Lights, Shahid and Aligarh, believes that Bollywood should not equate films with crores. “We are telling stories, and we need to embrace these stories. Cinema has been trivialized into crores,” rues Mehta who won a National Award for Best Direction for Shahid in 2012.

Though most of his films have been content-driven, they haven’t managed to gather numbers at the box-office. Undeterred, Mehta says that he still does not understand why the box-office game is for public consumption. He wishes that audiences watched films for their stories and did not focus on the numbers. “I think all that should matter is recovery and a reasonable return on investment,” he adds.

According to reports, Kangana has delivered a great performance in Simran. “She is a true star,” says the director who was working with the actress for the first time. “Kangana works very hard and has an X-factor which makes her a star. She is a true actor in this generation,” Mehta says. The director in one of his interviews also admitted he wouldn’t have made Simran without Kangana.

Kangana has also written some additional dialogue and screenplay for the film. Going by word of mouth feedback, Simran's opening weekend should exceed Rs 10 crore, which would be great given the costs. Simran has been shot in Atlanta, US. The film also features Soham Shah, Esha Tewari Pande, Manu Narayan, Aneesha Joshi and Rupinder Nagra in pivotal roles.