Box - Office Revolution

IT happened with Gulzar’s Maachis recently. Now, a Telugu film called Adavilo Anna ( literally, The Forest -Dwelling Brother)— starring Mohan Babu, the TDP’s Rajya Sabha MP— has raised a political storm. A sympathetic, melodramatic version of the PWG Naxalite uprising, it villainises the police force. It’s a theme that flies in the face of the policy pursued by Chandrababu Naidu’s TDP government.

Portraying the Naxalites as "champions of the downtrodden", the film has predictably got the state police baying for Mohan Babu’s scalp. Asks the Andhra Police Officers Association president, Mahaboob Sahib: "When policemen are laying down their lives in their fight against Naxalites, it’s sad that a ruling party MP has portrayed us as unwort h y." He says if Naidu doesn’t suspend Babu, it will be "double standards".

The plot revolves around the sadist figures of a DSP, a zamindar and a former minister who terrorise villagers. The hero’s father (also played by Babu) is shown as a member of the Telangana Communist movement. The hero, branded a Naxalite, takes refuge in the forest, where he raises a band of volunteers who finally triumph. All this happens in the constant hum of loaded dialogues penned by the Left-leaning Parachuri brothers, Venkateswara Rao and Gopalakrishna. The locales, too, are chosen with care: for one, Bhadrachalam in Khammam district (a PWG stronghold, where 16 cops were slain last month).

Says Babu: "Believe me, it’s a real life story." He has another, clever rationale: "The film is based on the ideology of my mentor, N.T. Rama Rao, who often described Naxalites as true patriots." Perhaps for this reason, Naidu has been wary. He has just mouthed generalities—" violence and sex are growing in films. We should have good films, which benefit society." The filmmaker, R. Narayana Murthy, is known for Left-oriented movies, like Yerra Sainyam

(Red Army) and Cheemala Dandu (Army of Ants). By being frontman for his latest venture, Babu may be inviting trouble. In films, he was a villain-turned-hero. Will it be vice versa in politics?