King (2008 film)
King is a 2008 Indian Telugu-language action comedy film produced by D. Sivaprasad Reddy on Kamakshi Movies banner and directed by Sreenu Vaitla. It stars Nagarjuna Akkineni, Trisha, Mamta Mohandas and Srihari in the lead roles, with music composed by Devi Sri Prasad. The film's plot-line is loosely based on the 1966 Telugu film Aastiparulu.
| King | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Sreenu Vaitla |
| Produced by | D. Siva Prasad Reddy |
| Written by | B. V. S. Ravi (dialogues) |
| Screenplay by | Sreenu Vaitla |
| Story by | Kona Venkat Gopimohan |
| Starring | Nagarjuna Akkineni Trisha Mamta Mohandas Srihari |
| Music by | Devi Sri Prasad |
| Cinematography | Prasad Murella |
| Edited by | M. R. Varma |
Production company | Kamakshi Movies |
Release date | 25 December 2008 |
Running time | 181 minutes |
| Country | India |
| Language | Telugu |
| Budget | ₹170 million (US$2.4 million). |
| Box office | ₹400 million (US$5.6 million). |
Plot
Raja Chandra Pratap Varma, aka King (Akkineni Nagarjuna) hails from a royal family, having taken over the legacy and riches after the death of his father Raja Ravi Chandra Varma (Sobhan Babu). King has a younger brother Ajay (Arjan Bajwa), mother (Geetha), maternal uncle (Dharmavarapu Subramanyam), and his late father's three sisters, who are married. Their husbands are Appaji (Jaya Prakash Reddy), Kona Venkat (Krishna Bhagavaan), and Gopi Mohan (Sayaji Shinde). The uncles steal money, which is for the workers. They make it look as though the employee Chandu is responsible. King believes and fires Chandu. Suddenly, King knew that the uncles hid the money in their room. He kept quiet because of his other family.
Before King leaves the airport, this mysterious guy is after King. A few days later, King and Swapna (Mamta Mohandas) are discussing something next to a graveyard. The same mysterious guy from the airport tries to shoot King, but misses. King chases the shooter to the graveyard, but Shooter suddenly disappeared. Munna (Supreeth) calls King's cellphone. King tells Munna that he's in a graveyard. Munna asks if King is OK, to which he says yes. Unfortunately, Swapna shoots King from behind. He sees her face and realizes that she was working with the shooter. Swapna shoots King again. King is presumed dead. Munna tells the police that King went missing. At least one day later, when the police takes Munna to a hospital morgue, a dead body looks like King. Munna lies to the police that none of the corpses are King's body. Kona Venkat and Gopi Mohan say that Appaji's responsible for King's disappearance. Appaji escapes, and it is assumed that he is responsible. King's mother believes that her son is safe.
Another story thread is incorporated through the introduction of gangster Bottu Seenu (Raghu Rokara) (also Nagarjuna), who falls in love with a singer Sravani (Trisha). Sravani does not care for a wastrel like Bottu Seenu, so he poses as a software engineer named Sarath to impress her. Bottu Seenu meets the real Sarath (Sunil). Sravani's elder brother Gnaneswar (Srihari) knows Bottu Seenu, but he would get mad at Bottu Seenu loving Sravani. Bottu Seenu pretends to be Sarath, who wears a tie, shirt, and pants. Gnaneswar gets fooled too. The real Sarath imposes Bottu Seenu in front of a cop by mistake. The cop mistakes Sarath as Bottu Seenu and beats him up really bad in a hilarious way.
Meanwhile, Appaji sends goons to look for King, thinking he's still alive. They run into Bottu Seenu, who thrashes them. Appaji proposes a deal to Bottu Seenu and asks him to pose as King and return to the palace. After Munna informed King's family that King disappeared, Appaji tried to escape, but he got picked up by Munna. Munna gave a picture of King's corpse, time, and date to Appaji. Appaji had nothing to do with King's murder. Once Bottu Seenu gets access to King's bank accounts, Appaji will be able to repay his debts because he borrowed much money from goons. Sravani and Gnaneswar mistake Bottu Seenu as Sharath again. They accompany Bottu Seenu to the palace. The first twists: Swapna is none other than Chandu's daughter, but Chandu committed suicide because nobody believed that he did not steal the money; Swapna and the mysterious shooter were hired by Bhagath Seth (Bharath Dhabolka); the mysterious shooter is Baba; and Swapna's real name is Pooja.
Bhagath hires Pooja to kill King's brother Ajay. Ajay brings his girlfriend Pooja to his home. Suddenly, Bottu Seenu attacks Pooja, but a few seconds later, he has no idea what happened. Gnaneshwar believes that King's spirit came to get revenge and controlled Bottu Seenu. Bottu Seenu gets engaged to Sravani. Pooja knows that it is not King who is living in the palace right now. Bhagath hires a bunch of guys, including Baba, to dress up in black and kill King's impostor and Ajay in the palace during the night. Bhagath Seth thinks that he shouldn't trust girls, including Pooja. Bottu Seenu is controlled by King's spirit and saves Ajay from Pooja. Another twist is that Ajay met Pooja right before she killed King. She feels that Ajay depends on his brother too much, so he told her to kill King. The third twist: Bottu Seenu/Sharath is revealed as King.
Munna captures Baba, who reveals his motive for planning to kill Swapna, who is Chandu's daughter, too. Pooja said what really happened that day but doesn't kill King. The father and friends who took care of Bottu Seenu were Munna's people. Munna's real name is Bottu Seenu. King says that Ajay's mistake is unforgivable. King's family members are feeling sad, so he decides to leave. He dies in an explosion which takes place in his car. King's mother leaves and doesn't want anyone to look for her. Everyone else is probably still mad at Ajay. The fourth twist is that King is still alive.
He reveals his plan to Shravani only: King asked Bhagath's henchman (who kidnapped Kittu at the beginning of the movie) to tell him Bhagath's evil plans. After King got shot, Munna took him to the hospital. Swapna's details were fake, so they couldn't find her. He decided to play this double role drama. Bhagath's henchman/King's informer reveals the shooter is working for Bhagath too, but didn't find details about Swapna. When King met his uncles again, none of them had anything to do with it. King realized that Kittu was behind everything. King's informer blew up King's car after he escaped. This was King's plan too. The informer put a bomb inside Bhagath's car too, so King talks to Bhagath on the phone before Bhagath dies. King pretends to be Sarath in front of everyone else.
The final twist: Bottu Seenu/Munna's father and friends were responsible for messing up lights and pulling table with rope in King's palace. They did it to make it look like King's spirit came for revenge.
Cast
- Nagarjuna Akkineni as Raja Chandra Pratap Verma aka King / Bottu Seenu / Sharath
- Trisha as Sravani
- Srihari as Gnaneshwar Bhai
- Mamta Mohandas as Swapna / Pooja
- Brahmanandam as Jayasurya
- Sunil as Sharath
- Chandra Mohan as Narayana
- Arjan Bajwa as Ajay
- Jaya Prakash Reddy as Appaji
- Krishna Bhagawan as Kona Venkat
- Sayaji Shinde as Gopi Mohan
- Geetha as King's mother
- Dharmavarapu Subramanyam as King's uncle
- Sudha as King's aunt
- Madhu Shalini as King's cousin
- M. S. Narayana as Sravani's uncle
- Surya as Swapna's father
- Ajay as Coal Kittu
- Supreeth as Munna / Bottu Seenu
- AVS as Manager
- Venu Madhav as Tension Bonda
- Radha Kumari as Sarath's grandmother
- Raavi Kondala Rao as Sarath's grandfather
- Abhinaya as Sravani's friend
- Srinivasa Reddy as Sai Kishore, Jayasurya's PA
- Fish Venkat as Gnaneswar's henchmen
- Duvvasi Mohan as Panthulu
- Jeeva as Wizard
- Master Bharath as Master
- Prudhviraj
- Surekha Vani
- Gundu Sudarshan
- Narsing Yadav
- Banerjee
- Sravan
- Gautam Raju
- Jenny
- Bharath Dhabolka as Bhagath Seth
- Chitram Seenu as Bottu Sennu's henchman
- Giridhar as Bottu Sennu's henchman
- Rama Chandar as Bottu Sennu's henchman
- Ranam Venu as Bottu Sennu's henchman
- Apoorva as King's aunt
- Srilalitha as Sravani's friend
- Rajitha as Sravani's aunt
- Bharat as Appaji's son
- Amith as Bhagath's son
- Chitti as DCP
- Devadas Kanakala as Secretariat Gopal Rao
- Chitraleka as Anchor
- Tarzan as Rowdy
- Ramajogayya Sastry as himself
- Kelly Dorji (cameo appearance in the Title Song)
Special Appearance Heroines in "Nuvvu Ready Nenu Ready" song inspired from Hindi movie "Om Shanti Om".
Soundtrack
| King | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Film score by | ||||
| Released | 2008 | |||
| Recorded | 2008 | |||
| Genre | Soundtrack | |||
| Length | 40:31 | |||
| Label | Aditya Music | |||
| Producer | Devi Sri Prasad | |||
| Devi Sri Prasad chronology | ||||
| ||||
Music was composed by Devi Sri Prasad. The tune of "O Manmadhuda" is reused from title track of Kannada movie Sangama_(film). All songs are hit tracks. Music was released on ADITYA Music Company.
| No. | Title | Lyrics | Singer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "King" | Ramajogayya Sastry | Leslie Lewis, Mamta Mohandas | 5:27 |
| 2. | "A to Z" | Ramajogayya Sastry | Naveen, Priya Himesh | 4:45 |
| 3. | "O Manmadhuda" | Ramajogayya Sastry | Sagar, Divya | 4:46 |
| 4. | "Yenthapani Chestiviro" | Ramajogayya Sastry, Sahithi | Vaddepalli Srinivas, Priya Himesh | 5:23 |
| 5. | "Ghanana Ghanana" | Ramajogayya Sastry | Ujjayinee | 3:38 |
| 6. | "Nenu Nee Raja" | Ramajogayya Sastry | Rahul Nambiar, Andrea Jeremiah | 5:17 |
| 7. | "Ghanana (Funny)" | Ramajogayya Sastry | Mamta Mohandas | 1:51 |
| 8. | "Nuvvu Ready Nenu Ready" | Ramajogayya Sastry | Shankar Mahadevan, Gopika Poornima, Priyamani (Cameo appearance) | 5:31 |
| 9. | "King (The DSP Mix)" | Ramajogayya Sastry | Devi Sri Prasad | 3:51 |
| Total length: | 40:31 | |||
Release
The film was dubbed into Hindi as King No. 1 in 2010 and into Tamil as Pudhukottai Azhagan.[1][2]