Interesting Facts
- Biggest fact here is that it was after Pokiri. Industry hit curse is a known fact in Telugu film industry. No Telugu movie has ever escaped from it. People think its Pushpa but due to the high rates and low ticket prices, it was actually a loss venture in Telugu states.
- The core team of Okkadu and Arjun were replaced for the movie with the exception of Sreekar Prasad, Sekhar V Joesph was replaced y Tamil cameraman Balasubramaniem, Mani Sharma for Harris Jayaraj, and Thota Tharani for Anand Sai,
- The music was released simultaneously in 10 venues from five countries – India, USA, Australia, Singapore and Dubai on the morning of 21 October 2006. The producer of the film, Ashwini Dutt, arranged the use of a satellite transmission to relay the live audio release across the globe
- Only Telugu film of legendary and highly respected actor Irfan Khan ji, we miss you sir
- Before he became an actor, he started his own production company, Spirit Media. In the film industry, Rana was a bit of an exception. Belonging to the Daggubati family, he started as a special effects coordinator. Rana Daggubati won the State Nandi Award for Best Special Effects in 2006 for the Telugu film Sainikudu, as a Visual Effects Producer.
Why did it fail
- Story - it’s about mixing politics with student violence battling corruption within the state government. Siddartha knows that Pappu Yaddav is corrupt so he nominates his friend to run against him, typical bullshit of a political candidate who can’t crush a fucking student who’s bothering him. He hires his henchman Prakash Raj to take him down but it doesn’t happen. Then to further disturb Pappu Yadav, he kidnaps Trisha and Stockholm syndrome occurs. But the question is why?
- Screenplay - terrible. Movie starts off well. It has the potential to be a commercial entertainer but none of the threads work. The threads about student politics, violence. Social commentary about political crimes for campaign purposes, love story, revenge, nothing gels properly. And mainly the movie has no excitement, its all boredom unlike Okkadu and Arjun when there is constant suspense and excitement to know ok, how will this end
- Direction - Gunashkear direction works for the opening sequence and Siddhartha’s first meeting with pappy Yadav and then everything falls apart. No grip on the screenplay, story is clearly haywire, and BGM was terrible Harris Jayaraj copied Pirates main BGM. Technical departments which were flawless in Arjun and Okkadu are not present in Sainikudu at all. There’s a Warangal Fort set they built used for a huge fight but for some reason it feels artificial and the actions sequences on the bridge and in climax are so bad.
- Hype - Pokiri rewrote 75 years of Telugu movie industry records and made 40 crores share and 75 crores gross. That’s still more than most movies today. It’s an unreal blockbuster so naturally people’s expectations are that it will be as good or better than Pokiri. Even the slightest disappointment would result in a disaster which is exactly what happened. Movie was boring and very disappointing. Mahesh Babu’s superstardom even couldn’t save the movie from sinking. Also it being 3rd movie in Mahesh babu Gunashekar combo. Both movies have great fanbases and even though Arjun was above average movie with some loss, Gunashekar was still able to make the film interesting despite thin storyline.
Final Thoughts - Harris Jayaraj the real MVP, the only reason why the movie is still relevant is due to the all time classic album. Every song is fire. My favorite is Orugalluke Pilla and Maayera. Andhra ni motham shake chesina paata.
