80 years of Tollywood journey - TeluguPeople.com News

Hyderabad: There is a popular refrain that when three Telugus meet for 10 minutes, they will certainly discuss cinema. In a land of different ideologies, cinema is the uniting factor irrespective of caste, region and profession.

Even visionaries such as Raghupati Venkaiah, the Father of Telugu Films and HM Reddy, the director of the first Telugu talkie, might have not estimated the importance of cinema in the lives of Telugus at that time.

The Telugu movie world, popularly known as Tollywood now, has a long history of eight decades. On September 15, 1931, the first ever talkie in Telugu, 'Bhakta Prahlada' was released and became an alternative to the then conventional forms of entertainment such as drama, tholubommalata, harikatha, etc.

The journey of Tollywood from 1931 to the present can be classified into different phases. In the initial phase starting from 1931 to 1941, Puranas and epics like Ramayana and Mahabharata have dominated the themes and accordingly, most of the movies have been made from them.

The Second Phase (1941- 61) had not only carried the storylines of Puranas, but also focussed on the popular mass stories from folklore. As such, Keelugurram, Bala Nagamma, Maya Bazaar were produced and became classics with their theme and technique in adapting them on the screen.

At this phase, the contemporary realistic films such as Shavukaaru and other social dramas were also made and created their own impression by
giving inspiration to the later film makers to make those movies.

The Third Phase(1961-71) had witnessed a 'Transition Period' of adopting new technologies from Black & White to fulllength colour features. Lava Kusa (1963) had become a milestone in the journey of Tollywood with its combination of traditional theme (of Ramayana) and modern technology (first ever colour movie).

The film had created a great sensation and pulled the rural audience to come to theatres on bullock-carts, which ultimately made the movie a phenomenal success.

The Fourth Phase (1971-88), had given the rise to the emergence of mass commercial cinema in Tollywood. The movies like Dasara Bullodu, Adavi Ramudu, Premabhishekam created a stir and rang the box-office with collections.

The other movies like Kondaveeti Simham, Sardar Paparayudu, Bobbili Puli, Naa Desham became instrumental in turning the popularity and craze of actor NTR as the chief minister in 1983.

On the other side, movies such as Khaidi (1983) had added new dynamism to the silver screen and set the emotional quotient of the audience on fire, with their mass action themes.

Then it is the Fifth Phase( 1989-2004), where new narratives with high technical values with different story plots within the frame of commercial mainstream cinema have been started.

Siva and Geetanjali had influenced the way Telugu films are generating and ignited new vistas. Some of the critics have opined that the history of Telugu films can be divided into two parts' 'Pre-Siva' and 'Post-Siva!

Now, Tollywood at its Sixth Phase, where young heroes and novel themes with feel good positive factor as essence, are ruling. Movies such as Anand, Bommarillu, Aa Naluguru, Mee Shreyobhilashi, Gamyam, Prasthanam, Sontha Ooru, Andari Bandhuvaya, Ganga Putrulu were produced.

Stardom and Box office:

On the actors front, Tollywood in the last eight decades had witnessed the emergence of five generations of heroes and their stardom. At first, it is Chittoor V Nagaiah followed by NTR-ANR duo. Krishna, Sobhan Babu, Krishnam Raju were the contemporaries and succeeded in establishing their own fan following with their own style of films like Gudhachari 116, Mosagallaku Mosagadu, Alluri Sitaramaraju; Devatha, Kaartheeka Deepam, Maharaju; Rangoon Rowdy, Katakatala Rudraih, Bobbili Brahmanna respectively.

The other generation heroes were led by Chiranjeevi-Balakrishna-Nagarjuna- Venkatesh.

The present generation heroes are more of starheirs and they are struggling hard to cash in on the bastions of 'Fandom' created by their parents and grandparents.

This list includes Mahesh Babu, NTR, Allu Arjun, Ramcharan Teja, Prabhas, Ram, Gopichand et al. The eight-decade-old Telugu film world had become synonymous for high budgets and heavy box-office collections too.

Adavi Ramudu is the first movie to cross the mark of Rs 4 crore, while Gharana Mogudu created a record with its Rs 10 crore collection. Later, Indra, Pokiri, and Arundhati had collected a staggering amounts of Rs 20 crores, Rs 32 crores, and Rs 35 crores respectively. But it is Magadheera, which broke all the previous records by reaching all-time heights of Rs 67 crores.

Infrastructure and New markets:

The Telugu film industry started its life in Chennai first and in 1970s shifted to Hyderabad. Thanks to the incessant efforts of the industry people, Tollywood now become the hub of movies.

Every year, it is producing 120 to 140 straight movies apart from 70 to 90 dubbing movies. As such, the industry is investing Rs 700 crores every year.

In addition to this, the infrastructure today supports 'state-of-the-art' movies with advanced high-end technologies. The laboratories, studios, recording theatres, film processing units and poster publicity units for pre-production, production and post-production of films now, have equipped with latest 'technical knowhow'.

The Ramanaidu Studios, Ramoji Film City( the largest studio in Asia) are ensuring the producers with all sorts of services in film making. And there are more than 1900 film theatres, 25 Multiplexes and one IMAX for the exhibition of the movies, across the state.

The Tollywood, with its eight decades of glorious past, now making experiments and expanding its horizons to new avenues. The film distribution system so far, is restricted to the areas like Nizam. Andhra, Ceded and other areas.