Super Star (2002 Film)
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''Super Star'' is a 2002 Indian
Kannada film Kannada cinema, also known as Sandalwood, or Chandanavana, is the segment of Indian cinema dedicated to the production of motion pictures in the Kannada language widely spoken in the state of Karnataka. Kannada cinema is based in Gandhi Nagar ...
written by
Upendra Upendra (Devanagari: उपेन्द्र) is an Indian masculine given name. The meaning of the Sanskrit word ' is "younger brother of Indra" and refers to either Krishna or Vishnu, who as a son of Aditi (or in the Vamana avatar) was born subs ...
and directed by
Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar is an Indian director, actor, screenwriter and a lyricist who predominantly works in Kannada film industry, Kannada Cinema. He made his film debut as a screenplay writer in ''Kadina Benki'' (1986) which won the Natio ...
, starring
Upendra Upendra (Devanagari: उपेन्द्र) is an Indian masculine given name. The meaning of the Sanskrit word ' is "younger brother of Indra" and refers to either Krishna or Vishnu, who as a son of Aditi (or in the Vamana avatar) was born subs ...
and
Keerthi Reddy Keerthi Reddy is an Indian former actress who appeared primarily in Telugu, Tamil films also appeared in Hindi and Kannada films. Her notable work includes '' Tholi Prema'' (1998), ''Pyaar Ishq Aur Mohabbat'' (2001) and '' Arjun'' (2004). She h ...
, in her Kannada debut. Though initially it was started as a remake of the Hindi film '' Agnisakshi'', the story was modified after the
Nepalese royal massacre The Nepalese royal massacre occurred on the night of 1 June 2001, at the Narayanhiti Palace in Kathmandu, the residence of the House of Shah, the Shah dynasty, royal family of Nepal. During a private gathering of the royal family, Crown Princ ...
involving King Dipendra. The movie is noted for having four climaxes which the audience could select according to their mindset. All these climaxes were based on the thought process of the character ''Sigaev'' found in
Anton Chekhov Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (; ; 29 January 1860 – 15 July 1904) was a Russian playwright and short-story writer, widely considered to be one of the greatest writers of all time. His career as a playwright produced four classics, and his b ...
's 1887 short story ''An Avenger''. It was dubbed into
Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of South India ** Telugu literature, is the body of works written in the Telugu language. * Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Tel ...
as ''Stupid'', which was a lot more successful than the Kannada version.


Plot

Devayani is told by a priest that her marrying is like she being hanged to death. Devayani is enraged listening to this. On the same day, she is returning home from a library when she collides against Ricky's car. Ricky falls in love with her and confesses, but she rejects him. His other attempts to impress her fail too. On the insistence of her cousin, Devayani decides to apologize to Ricky for her harsh behavior.  One day, Devayani gets an offer to go to Thailand from her cousin and decides to take it due to her low mood. There, she is abandoned by her local guide Richard but is surprised and elated to see Ricky, and Devayani realizes her feelings for him. In the hotel where both of them stayed, an injured Deependra, a prince who recognizes Devayani as his lover, hugs her and expresses his feelings. Devayani is frightened by his behavior. Soon, Deependra is hospitalized. Devayani and Ricky return to India.  Deependra comes to India in search of Devayani. He tells Ricky that Devayani is indeed his girlfriend and that he had killed his entire family because they had lied to him that if Devayani and Deependra were to marry, his parents would die as per the astrological predictions. Ricky later learns that Deependra's love is unreciprocated and that Devayani was too scared to tell this to Deependra as he was a prince. So Ricky decides to make Deependra understand that Devayani never loved him. Ricky fails in all his attempts. In his last attempt, Ricky advises Devayani to follow her heart. On a rainy night, Deependra plucks his eyes off and cuts his ears and limbs off, dedicating them to Devayani. Devayani has an emotional turmoil and runs to Deependra, but the latter dies. Next morning, Ricky takes Devayani on a jeep where it is revealed that Ricky with her now is Deependra and the one who died the previous night was actually Ricky. Deependra then revealed that, previous day after he confessed to Ricky of how he felt like dying so that he could finally get her love, Ricky then asks what if she didn't love him even after that, and then made up a plan to exchange their character since they both looked alike. Then Ricky, as Deependra would fake his death just to have the original Deependra confirm whether Devayani loved him or not. Devayani is horrified to know this and tells that even if her eyes deceived her, her heart still chose Ricky as she loved Ricky.  She runs away to commit suicide by jumping into a waterfalls.  She is saved by Deependra. Devayani throws him off into the water only for Ricky to come there. Deependra manages to climb up and come in front of them. The climax scene has four different endings. It is the four different endings Deependra tries to give to his and Devayani's story.  The first one is where Deependra thinks of shooting Ricky so that Devayani too can experience the sufferings of an unfulfilled love like he did. But he remembers Ricky's kind nature, how he tried to unite him and Devayani. He drops off his plan to kill Ricky. Then he thinks of killing Devayani as she did not understand his love for her. But he realizes that he has killed his entire family for his love and decides not kill her too. He decides to kill himself as he believes he wasn't worthy enough to be loved. Again, he thinks that he must not commit suicide like a coward. He thinks that he must not give up his life for a girl and being a prince of a nation, he must serve his subjects, give back their love instead.


Cast

*
Upendra Upendra (Devanagari: उपेन्द्र) is an Indian masculine given name. The meaning of the Sanskrit word ' is "younger brother of Indra" and refers to either Krishna or Vishnu, who as a son of Aditi (or in the Vamana avatar) was born subs ...
as
Dipendra of Nepal Dipendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev () (27 June 1971 – 4 June 2001) was King of Nepal for three days from 1 to 4 June 2001. For the duration of his three-day reign he was in a coma after the shooting of his father King Birendra, his mother Queen Ai ...
/ Rock Star Ricky *
Keerthi Reddy Keerthi Reddy is an Indian former actress who appeared primarily in Telugu, Tamil films also appeared in Hindi and Kannada films. Her notable work includes '' Tholi Prema'' (1998), ''Pyaar Ishq Aur Mohabbat'' (2001) and '' Arjun'' (2004). She h ...
as Devyani Rana * V. Manohar as psychiatrist *
Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar is an Indian director, actor, screenwriter and a lyricist who predominantly works in Kannada film industry, Kannada Cinema. He made his film debut as a screenplay writer in ''Kadina Benki'' (1986) which won the Natio ...
in a guest appearance * Karthik Sharma


Production

The film was supposed to be directed by seven to eight different directors who backed out for various reasons before
Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar is an Indian director, actor, screenwriter and a lyricist who predominantly works in Kannada film industry, Kannada Cinema. He made his film debut as a screenplay writer in ''Kadina Benki'' (1986) which won the Natio ...
was chosen.
Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar is an Indian director, actor, screenwriter and a lyricist who predominantly works in Kannada film industry, Kannada Cinema. He made his film debut as a screenplay writer in ''Kadina Benki'' (1986) which won the Natio ...
had mentioned in an interview that, although he was credited as the director, he was not given much freedom on the sets and
Upendra Upendra (Devanagari: उपेन्द्र) is an Indian masculine given name. The meaning of the Sanskrit word ' is "younger brother of Indra" and refers to either Krishna or Vishnu, who as a son of Aditi (or in the Vamana avatar) was born subs ...
was the one who took decisions regarding the shoot of the movie.


Soundtrack

The music for the movie was composed and lyrics were penned by
Hamsalekha Gangaraju (born June 23, 1951), professionally known as Hamsalekha, is an Indian film composer and songwriter who works in South Indian cinema, predominantly in the Kannada film industry since the late 1980s. He is also a screenplay writer, d ...
. The track "Thagole Thagole" was a chartbuster.


Critical reception

The reaction from the critics turned out to be mostly negative upon the film's release. While the performances of the lead artistes, unique story line of the film, soundtrack, background music and other technical aspects of the film were praised, the screenplay of the film was the most criticized by critics as well as the audience. Many audience members felt that the film was not Nagathahalli Chandrashekhar's genre movie, but that of Upendra's.


Box office


Karnataka

''Superstar'' had an extremely strong opening at the box office across
Karnataka Karnataka ( ) is a States and union territories of India, state in the southwestern region of India. It was Unification of Karnataka, formed as Mysore State on 1 November 1956, with the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, 1956, States Re ...
similar to the earlier record breaking openers of
Upendra Upendra (Devanagari: उपेन्द्र) is an Indian masculine given name. The meaning of the Sanskrit word ' is "younger brother of Indra" and refers to either Krishna or Vishnu, who as a son of Aditi (or in the Vamana avatar) was born subs ...
and set the box office on fire during its opening weekend. The film continued to storm the box office during its initial weeks, but failed to live up to the expectations and most of the fans were disappointed by the movie. ''Superstar'' ended up becoming a below average grosser in
Karnataka Karnataka ( ) is a States and union territories of India, state in the southwestern region of India. It was Unification of Karnataka, formed as Mysore State on 1 November 1956, with the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, 1956, States Re ...
by running only for 6 weeks in its main centre in
Bangalore Bengaluru, also known as Bangalore (List of renamed places in India#Karnataka, its official name until 1 November 2014), is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the southern States and union territories of India, Indian state of Kar ...
. The film was sold to distributors at a very high distribution price and got an extraordinary opening in its initial weeks, thus returning investment for the producer. Compared to Upendra's earlier blockbuster movies like '' A'', ''
Upendra Upendra (Devanagari: उपेन्द्र) is an Indian masculine given name. The meaning of the Sanskrit word ' is "younger brother of Indra" and refers to either Krishna or Vishnu, who as a son of Aditi (or in the Vamana avatar) was born subs ...
'', ''
Preethse ''Preethse'' () is a 2000 Indian Kannada-language psychological thriller film starring Shiva Rajkumar, Upendra and Sonali Bendre. The film was directed by D Rajendra Babu and produced by Rockline Venkatesh. A major part of the film was shot in ...
'', '' H2O'', this film was considered as average hit as it returned investment for the producer.


Andhra Pradesh

The
Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of South India ** Telugu literature, is the body of works written in the Telugu language. * Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Tel ...
dubbed version of ''Superstar'' which was released in
Andhra Pradesh Andhra Pradesh (ISO 15919, ISO: , , AP) is a States and union territories of India, state on the East Coast of India, east coast of southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, seventh-largest state and th ...
in 2003 (a year after its original
Kannada Kannada () is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly in the state of Karnataka in southwestern India, and spoken by a minority of the population in all neighbouring states. It has 44 million native speakers, and is additionally a ...
release) was titled as ''Stupid - O Pichi Vadi Prema Katha'' and had a good opening across
Andhra Pradesh Andhra Pradesh (ISO 15919, ISO: , , AP) is a States and union territories of India, state on the East Coast of India, east coast of southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, seventh-largest state and th ...
, owing mainly to
Upendra Upendra (Devanagari: उपेन्द्र) is an Indian masculine given name. The meaning of the Sanskrit word ' is "younger brother of Indra" and refers to either Krishna or Vishnu, who as a son of Aditi (or in the Vamana avatar) was born subs ...
's Telugu fan following which he had gained due to the large success of the
Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of South India ** Telugu literature, is the body of works written in the Telugu language. * Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Tel ...
versions of his earlier blockbuster movies like '' A'' and ''
Upendra Upendra (Devanagari: उपेन्द्र) is an Indian masculine given name. The meaning of the Sanskrit word ' is "younger brother of Indra" and refers to either Krishna or Vishnu, who as a son of Aditi (or in the Vamana avatar) was born subs ...
'', and a few straight Telugu movies like '' Raa'' and '' Kanyadanam'' which were box office hits. Although ''Superstar'' was just an average grosser in
Karnataka Karnataka ( ) is a States and union territories of India, state in the southwestern region of India. It was Unification of Karnataka, formed as Mysore State on 1 November 1956, with the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, 1956, States Re ...
, ''Stupid'' surprisingly turned out to be a hit in
Andhra Pradesh Andhra Pradesh (ISO 15919, ISO: , , AP) is a States and union territories of India, state on the East Coast of India, east coast of southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, seventh-largest state and th ...
by completing 100 days of run and its distributors in Andhra Pradesh earned fair profits from the movie.


See also

*
Nepalese royal massacre The Nepalese royal massacre occurred on the night of 1 June 2001, at the Narayanhiti Palace in Kathmandu, the residence of the House of Shah, the Shah dynasty, royal family of Nepal. During a private gathering of the royal family, Crown Princ ...
*
Dipendra of Nepal Dipendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev () (27 June 1971 – 4 June 2001) was King of Nepal for three days from 1 to 4 June 2001. For the duration of his three-day reign he was in a coma after the shooting of his father King Birendra, his mother Queen Ai ...
* Devyani Rana


References


External links

{{Upendra Films set in India 2002 films 2000s Kannada-language films Films scored by Hamsalekha Indian films based on actual events Films directed by Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar Fiction with multiple endings