The phenomenal success of ‘Arjun Reddy’ paved way for the path breaking Telugu film to be remade in several languages including Hindi. But, the lead role essayed by Vijay Deverakonda is so challenging and audacious that hardly any top hero is willing to reprise it despite having witnessed its potential.

Director Sandeep Vanga, who helmed the Telugu version, is also on board to direct the Bollywood remake. His first choice for the lead role was Ranveer Singh considering how eccentric and enigmatic an actor the ‘Bajirao Mastani’ star is. Ranveer however turned down the role as he wasn’t keen to play another intense character after playing Allauddin Khilji in ‘Padmaavat’.

Sandeep then approached another top hero, Shahid Kapoor, who also turned down the offer for the reasons best known to him. As the next option, the director identified another young hero, Arjun Kapoor, who finally gave his nod and agreed to come on board. The lead heroine is yet to be finalized.

The Bollywood remake will go on floors this year itself.

In a record deal, the satellite rights of Allu Arjun’s ongoing film Naa Peru Surya Naa Illu India has been sold for a staggering Rs 23.75 Crore. The deal includes the TV and digital rights of both Telugu and Hindi-dubbed version. A popular entertainment channel who has good base in North and Telugu states has dug deep into its pocket and bagged the rights.

Considering that the Hindi-dubbed films of Allu Arjun have got good TRPs and record views on YouTube, the channel has closed the deal in much advance. So far, only the film’s first impact has been released. The film’s teaser, trailer are due for release. Even before this, the film’s TV rights fetch a handsome 23.75 Crore that covers a prominent part of the film’s budget.

Allu Arjun’s last films Sarrainodu, DJ have got huge TRP ratings during their TV premieres. They reportedly got non-Baahubali TRP ratings during their first telecast. Even in YouTube, the Hindi-dubbed Sarrainodu got 123 million-plus views till date. This is substantial figure. All these said to have prompted, the TV channel to spend a whopping money on the rights.

Meanwhile, the TV rights of Malayalam-dubbed version of Naa Peru Surya are yet to be sold. Directed by Vakkantham Vamsi, producers Lagadapati Sridhar and Bunny Vas are laughing all the way to the bank.

Shruti Haasan is looking smoking hot in her latest photo-shoot where she posed for Femina cover. Clad in a sizzling black-and-red, Shruti’s sizzling appearance is turning many heads.

On career front, her last major hit in Telugu was Srimanthudu which was an industry hit which is followed by Premam. Shruti was last seen in Pawan Kalyan’s Katamarayudu, the Telugu remake of Ajith’s Veeram. After Katamarayudu tanked at the Box Office, Shruti has been missing in Telugu cinema.

Meanwhile, a lot seems to be happening for Shruti on personal front. There have been rumours that she would tie the knot with her rumoured beau London-based actor Michael Corsale. Amidst wedding rumours, Telugu filmmakers seem to be thinking twice before roping in Shruti. It needs to be seen, what is in store for Shruti in 2018.

The makers of Anushka’s “Bhaagamathie” have closely guarded a surprise in order to give maximum thrill to audience in theatres. They have revealed all the principle characters in the film in the theatrical trailer that was unveiled a couple of days ago, but hidden the main villain character.

Young Tamil hero Aadi Pinisetty, who essayed the chief antagonist in Pawan Kalyan’s “Agnyaathavaasi”, has also played the villain character in “Bhaagamathie”. He however did not feature in the trailer. We have learnt that his look and characterization will stun audience when they unfold on big screen. His role will be in the flashback episode involving Bhaagaathie. Aadi’s character and performance is said to be another major highlight of the film besides Anushka’s whistle worthy performance.

Produced by UV Creations, Bhaagamathie is all set to hit screens on Jan 26.

Currently, one talk is being heard much stronger in film circles. It is about Pawan Kalyan, Trivikram and producer S Radhakrishna taking care of Agnyaathavaasi distributors. As the film is likely to spell 60-70 crores losses from the box office, almost all the distributors are likely to end up in a slump.

Ace producer and distributor Dil Raju who has bought this #PSPK25 for 27 crores have so far recovered only 10.3+ crores share and the balance 17 crores sounds like almost impossible. Even the USA distributor who acquired the theatrical rights at a whopping price of 22 crores managed to accumulate only 7+ crores in the first week of film’s run at box office. So how are they going to tackle the loss?

One may say that these distributors will now storm the offices of producer and demand him return their investment, but that is not possible. As per highly placed sources, the makers have taken “Non-Returnable Advance” and also got the distributors signed “No Recovery Agreement” which makes them legally unable to make any demand for seeking a return.

Keeping the craze of Pawan Kalyan in mind, distributors would have thought that recovering such big investments is easy as Trivikram is a bankable director. But this half-baked rip of French film Largo Winch has dashed the hopes of everyone. With no legal way to demand money back, the distributors have to wait if Pawan and Trivikram will take losses to their shoulders and return some money.

Income Tax sleuths have raided producer C Kalyan’s office in Jubilee Hills area of Hyderabad. Amidst news reports of Kalyan’s latest production Jai Simha running successfully and emerging as Sankranthi winner, IT officials said to have raided Kalyan’s office.

The raids have been currently going on. More details related to raids are yet to be known.

Starring Balakrishna, Nayantara in the lead roles, the film directed by KS Ravi Kumar has been released on Jan 12 and has collected a gross of 26.5 Crore (15.17 Crore distributor share) in 4 days. The film’s world-wide theatrical rights have been sold for Rs 27 Crore.

From a time, Crime Branch police from Kerala are waiting for heroine Amala Paul to turn up before them in connection with a tax evasion case. In the wake of this hottie buying a luxury car and getting it registered in Pondicherry to evade a tax close to Rs 20 lakhs, she’s served with notices by the police.

To get some respite in this case, actually, Amala has approached High Court for anticipatory bail. But with Court advising that they will consider the bail plea only after she appears before Crime Branch police, Amala has other day surrendered before the police. The news is coming out that she has agreed to evading tax to Kerala government by submitting fake address proofs to Pondicherry government. However, she got an anticipatory bail and was out.

In fact, heroine Amala Paul, actors Fahad Fassil and Suresh Gopi were charged with offences like cheating, forgery and use of forged documents as genuine ones under section 420, 468 and 471 of IPC, which happens to be a non-bailable offence.  of the Indian Penal Code. The offences are non-bailable and carry a punishment of up to seven years of rigorous imprisonment.

We have to see what happens to the likes of these Mallu celebs from Kochi now. After turning up before police, Amala refused to speak with media and left the scene in a jiffy.

In a shocking incident, young actor Sidhu R Pillai, who prominently acts in Malayalam films, was found dead in Goa on Monday (Jan 15, 2018). Son of popular film producer PKR Pillai, Sidhu was 27-yr-old. Sidhu acted in as many as 16 movies, including Chithram, Vandanam and Amrutham Gamaya among others.

Sidhu went to Goa on January 12. It was still not clear how he was dead. However, as per some media reports, Sidhu was drowned to death in a beach. Siddhu was noted for his role as villain in Dulquer Salmaan’s debut Second Show.

Expressing shock, Dulquer has condoled Sidhu’s untimely demise. Dulquer tweeted, “Disturbed and sad about the passing of #SidhuRPillai ! Was an excited and vivacious youngster during #SecondShow. Prayers to his family.”

Cops are said to be probing the sudden, accidental death of Sidhu. More details are yet to be known.

Besides being a successful star, Nagarjuna also proved himself as a profitable producer. He had been branded as a producer who makes ‘tasteful’ films. But, Nag is slowly losing this brand. His brand is now taking a beating with his production ventures failing miserably.

Except Manam, Soggade, and Rarandoyi none of his own production worked at the Box Office. Even revenue-wise, he hasn’t made much money on any of his production ventures. Though Soggade minted money at the box office, that was mostly adjusted to the buyers, distributors of Akhil who lost hefty losses. Oka Laila Kosam, Nirmala Convent too bitten the dust at the ticket windows.

Hello has added more woes as the film didn’t work commercially although it bagged decent reviews. And now, Rangula Ratnam also became a dud. Though it was given to buyers, distributors ‘free of cost’ for people who lost money on Hello, it needs to be seen whether distributors would be happy with such a lackluster film.

Earlier, many in industry and trade have a great belief on Nag’s ‘judgment’. But of late, slowly trade, industry folks seem to be disappointed with Nag’s ‘judgment’ of stories, films.

Since he has already announced to produce a film for his elder son Naga Chaitanya, Nag needs to be highly conscious so that mistakes won’t be repeated.It is high time, Nag should bounce back!

In many areas, the distributors and buyers of Agnyaathavaasi are coinciding with the upcoming small and medium budget films who have committed to distribute the films in their areas.

With most of their monies lost due to Agnyaathavaasi, distributors and buyers may not pay their advance amounts to the upcoming films as committed earlier. This is indeed big shock to the producers of upcoming films.

A small token amount is paid by distributors who agreed to distribute the films. Ahead of the release day or release days, distributors come forward and pay the balance advance amounts and get the prints or keys. Only if the fully committed amount is paid, producers give their content to distributors. This is the usual procedure.

But whenever a big film bombs at the Box Office, the following releases get highly affected. Since most of major distributors lose chunk of money, they may not pay the balance advance amount to the producers as committed before. Whether producers should release the film with them or else they may give to others or they have to postpone the release is the producer’s call. After all, the money in industry is largely rotated. Lack of money would certainly be burden to upcoming releases only.

Taking advantage of this tricky situation of producers of small, medium films, even the competitive distributors would only offer only smaller advances now. So, producers are clue less whether to release their films with lesser advance amounts or to postpone their films.

Trivikram has indeed let down the distributors, fans, producers of upcoming films and movie lovers. Tollywood is expected to go through rough patch till a next big hit.