Women-centric movies back in spotlight: Anushka to retain her flag-bearer tag
Glam diva Anushka Shetty has returned with a bang and is doing author-backed roles in ‘Ghaati’ with director Krish. She is also considering doing a sequel to her earlier thriller ‘Bhaagmathie’ to retain her flag-bearer tag. “Anushka Shetty has transcended varied barriers with her immense talent and attained a larger-than-life image, almost on a par with big male heroes, and proved her crowd-pulling prowess from ‘Arundhati’ to latest ‘Miss Shetty Mister Polishetty' and her comeback augurs well for lady-centric movies,” says Hemamth Madhukar who worked with her in 'Nishabdam'.
However, her colleagues like Kajal Aggarwal with ‘Satyabhama’ and Anjali with ‘Geetanjali Malli Vachindi’ couldn’t spin box office magic. “It will take some time for actresses to gain crowd-pulling prowess although many would like to join the bandwagon. With few heroines unable to draw in openings, it has become difficult for makers to invest money in them,” he adds.
Maybe, young heroines like Rashmika Mandanna, who is doing a solo-heroine thriller ‘Rainbow’, and Keerthy Suresh who has done a few films like ‘Mahanati’ to ‘Miss India’ would give a fillip to women-based movies in Tollywood. Of course, Samantha proved her box office pull by making hits out of 'OH Baby! ' and 'Yashoda' to be hailed a crowd puller. "Samantha has been breathing life into lady-centric movies these days. We cannot say the same about others. Only a handful have become crowd pullers but the hero's number is much higher in comparison,” says producer Lagadapati Sridhar.
Giving an actress perspective, young diva Payal Rajput says, “Carrying a film on our shoulders is a difficult challenge and even my recent film ‘Mangalavaram’ revolved around my character and did commercially well. Author-backed roles allow us to showcase our versatility which is otherwise restricted in other movies and I am game for such meaty roles” she informs.
Nonetheless, producer-director Abhishek Nama welcomes the trend of new-age actresses donning author-backed roles “It is a good sign that new-age actresses like Rashmika and Keerthy Suresh are doing female-centric movies. They are sure to give a boost to the lady-oriented genre in the Telugu filmdom. The audience would like to see them in multi-faceted roles, over their one-dimensional avatars in star-driven movies,” he reasons.
"If we cast a heroine as the protagonist, we can bring out varied emotions through their performances, unlike a hero-centric movie, where directors are restricted to just depict action and romance," concludes Nama.
