Chiru joins the league of NTR and Krishna

Reigning star Chiranjeevi joins the elite league of legendary NTR and Krishna in donning a patriotic role in his upcoming movie 'Sye Raa….'.

He brings to life a real-life freedom fighter, who was the first one to take on the might of Britishers in India. "I wanted to bring the valiant role on screen.

Although, it took lot of time finally, I am able to achieve my dream of donning the role of a freedom fighter in my career," said Chiru at an event, with a glint of pride.

No doubt, T-town is gripped with patriotic fever as 'Tagore' star has gone in for a makeover and his fans are awaiting the release with high expectations since the magnum opus has been traded for more than Rs 100 crore in the two Telugu states, adds distributor Meesala Srinivas.

Earlier, legendary NTR played fictional revolutionary in 'Sardar Paparayudu', a semi-periodic film, but superstar Krishna's performance as real-life tribal leader 'Alluri Seetharamaraju' is still etched in the minds of Telugu viewers.

"After doing commercial potboilers, Krishna silenced his detractors by breathing life into the role of renowned freedom fighter Allu Seetharamaraju.

Set between 1922–24, the story takes place during the independence movement in the Madras Presidency. While inspiring the lives of many, Raju led his troop in a battle against the British.

It eventually turned out to be one of the iconic movies in the annals of Telugu cinema," says producer Adi Seshagiri Rao, brother of legendary Krishna, who claims that Krishna still remembers the days of that film.

"Even now, he vividly remembers the dialogues, songs and locations since the film has become part of his life, although, he did hundreds of movies," adds Rao.

Among the 50-plus actors, Venkatesh played the fictional role of freedom fighter in 'Subhash Chandra Bose' but it turned out to be a disaster.

Similarly, Balakrishna was unlucky with his patriotic role in semi-periodic movie 'Okka Mogadu' as the film crashed at the box office.

"Pulling off a freedom fighter role is not everybody's cup of tea and it demands a great dose of performance and also a story needs to connect with the masses," says director Kodandarami Reddy, who claims that Kamal Haasan's 'Bharateeyudu 2' was a good blend of patriotism and corruption.

"Apart from Kamal Haasan's stand out performance, director Shankar tactfully blended patriotism with contemporary menace-corruption and made it a new-age film which worked in its favour, rather than making a full-fledged patriotic film around freedom fighters and Britishers," he adds.

In fact, the genre has become rare nowadays, some filmmakers still seek inspiration from this genre to uplift spirits and fill Indians with a sense of pride.

Like ace director S S Rajamouli, who is making a fictional periodic saga revolving around two mighty revolutionaries-Allu Seetharamaraju and Komaram Bheem, with dash of patriotism and valour.

"It could fetch new-age stars like Jr NTR and Ram Charan larger-than-life image." says B Gopal.