Of late, Kona Venkat became newsmaker rather just a writer, producer and director. The way his name splashes in controversies, his routine-masala films score blockbusters and the projects he produces, are always a news. Here is another one.

Featuring Nikhil and Nandita in the leads, Kona Venkat is now producing “Shankarabaranam”, a crime thriller set in Bihar backdrop. Buzz says from a long time that this film is actually a free-make of Hindi movie ‘Phas Gaya Re Obama’.

However there is never any confirmation about it, until Kona spilled the beans today. “The original idea of Shankarabharanam is taken from “Phas gaya re obama” & woven our story around it. We have taken rights for entire south!!”, said Kona.

It takes guts for any writer, director or producer to announce before the release that they have purchased remake rights and took central plot from that movie to make their new film. In that context, we have to admire Kona for his guts and belief in the content they have re-designed.

After staying away from arc lights for nearly 1 year, actor Venkatsh is all set to return to face camera. Venky is teaming up with director Maruthi who is basking in the glory of stupendous success of Bhale Bhale Magadivoi. Currently, Maruthi is fine tuning the script and the film is expected to roll on from December.

Tipped to be a family entertainer with sentiment and action elements, the film will see the combo of Venky, Nayantara again. Venky and Nayan were earlier paired in films like Lakshmi, Tulasi. After long time, the duo is going to romance on screen. The yet-to-be-titled movie will be produced by Suresh Babu.

Though Venky and Maruthi were supposed to team up before for a film “Radha”, the movie failed to take off due to script issues. Now that Maruthi is in good form with BBM, Venky given his go ahead to Maruthi. If all goes well, the movie will be officially launched on the eve of Venkatesh’s birthday in December.

After getting postponed from October 22nd, “Akhil” is completely out of news. There is a reason because fans went berserk from the moment the postponement is announced. Despite Nagarjuna and Nitin appealing to them about the unprecedented Computer Graphics issue, they have never listened. So, what’s the new date of Akhil’s debut film?

From a long time it’s doing rounds that Akhil will release on 11th November on the eve of Diwali. However, there is no such talk confirming the news. We’ve come to know from few Overseas distributors that indeed “Akhil” is arriving for 11th. Already premiere shows are also confirmed for 10th evening and night. King Nagarjuna will be soon announcing this release date to the audiences in a special press meet.

Actually Nagarjuna is said to be scared by “Damarukam” experiences where he has held press meets and announced dates twice but the film never made to theatres. At one such press meet, Nag has even broke down a little, because that’s first time in his career where his word failed to stand. He doesn’t want such mistakes repeated with Akhil. Once the Censoring is done and hard drives exported, maybe Nag will announce the date.

Villain-turned-hero Gopichand has a great sentiment for the titles of his movies. The actor seems to have special fetish for the titles that end with ‘zero’ in Telugu. The titles of Gopi’s previous films include Jayam, Varsham, Yagnam, Lakshyam, Souryam, Loukyam. And it’s no surprise that his upcoming film has been titled as Soukyam which is being directed by AS Ravi Kumar Chowdhary who earlier directed Gopi in Yagnam.

Now that both Ravi Kumar (after Sai Dharam Tej’s Pilla Nuvvu Leni Jeevitham) and Gopichand (Loukyam) are in good form , expectations on Soukyam are high. Regina Cassandra is playing Gopi’s romantic interest. Currently, the makers are canning songs on the lead pair in the abroad.

Billed to be an action entertainer laced with good dose of comedy, it’s heard that the film also has high emotional scenes. It’s heard that producer is planning to release the film on December 25th on the eve of Christmas. Let’s wait and see whether Gopi’s sentiment for title work in favour of the film or not.

It was highly rumoured that young hero Nani backed out of South top director Manirathnam’s film. In fact, the movie, which was supposed to be launched long back, has been being postponed by its makers due to unknown reasons and so are the gossips against Nani.

However, sources close to the makers have revealed that Nani has not opted out of the romantic entertainer and the project will be on. Nani too, is eagerly waiting to work with the legendary director. Earlier Dilquer was supposed to be roped in as the lead star of this Telugu-Tamil bilingual. Later, he was replaced by Nani.

Nani’s ‘Bhale Bhale Magadivoi’ has stood as the biggest hit in Nani’s career and it was one of the blockbusters among this year’s releases. Lavanya Tripathi has played the female lead of the movie. The movie’s music was scored by Gopi Sunder. Maruthi has directed the movie in this Bunny Vas’ production venture.