No longer 'First Class First Pass'

The other day, my 10-year old son asked me “what is your job, daddy?”

“Brand Consultant,” I replied.

Pat came a dialogue. “Surya Bhai is not the name of a person, it is a Brand.” For those not in the know, this dialogue is from the latest Tollywood (nickname for Telugu film industry) movie `Businessman’ directed by Puri Jagannadh, which has Mahesh Babu playing the protagonist. It was clear the impression the film and its dialogues had made on my son.

Tollywood and Bollywood movies in the last couple of years have introduced various professions. Times have changed from the times when the hero would come rushing in to say, he has passed First Class First !

Till the last decade or so, protagonists mainly donned the role of a doctor, lawyer, painter, police officer and at times, a businessman. In fact, a widowed mother taking her son to the garlanded portrait of her husband and saying “dekhiye aapka beta Barrister ban gaya (see your son has become a lawyer)” was a common scene in majority of the films.

However in recent times, Tollywood has churned out movies like Manmathudu, Vinayakudu and recently Businessman where the stories are woven around advertising and branding. Venkatesh-starrer `Chintakayala Ravi’ had the protagonist playing a software engineer struggling to settle in the US.

In Bollywood also, movies like Wake Up Sid, Corporate, Page 3 and Life In A Metro have shown the masses the various career options that one can choose depending on their interests and academic capabilities.

While watching the current set of movies being rolled out is not all that good for growing up kids, the only silver lining perhaps is that they get to know a little bit more about career options other than engineering and medicine.

Tollywood Dreams!

Not long ago there was a Telugu film called `Money' that had a character called Khan Dada, immortalized by popular Telugu comedian Brahmanandam. His punchline in the film was ``Khan tho games adaku'' (Don’t play games with Khan).


In the film, Khan Dada happens to be a local goon whose ultimate dream is to become a film hero but gets duped to the tune of Rs 30 lakh by an imposter (pretender) who claims to have connections in the film industry. Khan Dada wants to take revenge on the person who has fooled him but cannot do much since the cops are after him given his track record.

While the story ends with each character hunting one another, the imposter is the ultimate beneficiary.

In the recent past, a similar story happened in real life, though the climax is still awaited. Bhanu Prakash, an aide of factionist Suri got access to funds of the latter who was serving a jail term and invested the money in Tollywood without his knowledge. When Suri was out of jail on bail after a few months, he threatened Bhanu, asking him to return the money. Fearing for his life, Bhanu allegedly eliminated Suri and is now on the run.

Like the imposter who benefitted in the reel story, small-time producers who languished in Tollywood studios for years, are the beneficiaries for now as Bhanu invested large sums of money in the film industry through these producers.

While Khan Dada could not become a hero in `Money', Bhanu certainly has become a real villain running after his Tollywood dreams.