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Credits

Banner: Suresh Productions

Cast: Venkatesh, Anjala Zhaveri, Jaya Prakash Reddy, Srihari, Chandramohan, Ahuthi Prasad, Parachuri Venkateswara Rao, Gokina Rama Rao, Raghunatha Reddy, Kolla Ashok Kumar, Banerjee, Jeeva, Babu Mohan, Venu Madhav, Brahmannandham, Gundu Hanumantha Rao, Uttej, Annapurna, Sudda, Ramaprabha, Rajitha,

Music: Mahesh Mahadevan & Mani Sharma

Dialogues - Screenplay: Parachute Dialogues

Story: Deenraj

Editing: KA Marthand & Marthand K Venkatesh

Art Direction: A. Chanti

Fights: Kanal Kannan

Direction: Jayanth C Paranji

Producer: Suresh Babu

Release Date: May 9th, 1997

Interesting Facts

Jayant worked as assistant director for Suresh Productions for 3 movies. He was also looking to become a full time director. And he was doing documentaries and ad films in the mean time. He was working on a mass movie called Adavi Manishi starring Venkatesh in the lead role and Parachute Bros were working on the story but it wasnt working out
Then Deenraj came with this story titled Premichukundam Raa and actually Jayant was not the first director for the movie. That director didn’t like it so he left. Then they took the story to Jayanth. The original story was actually Venkatesh helping Chandramohan and Sudha’s kid they were actually older, intermediate student and he was the one who falls in love with Angela Zhaveri and then Venkatesh helping their love succeed. Jayanth said no why don’t we give Venkatesh himself the love story. Parachuri Brothers, Suresh Babu, Venkatesh, team, 3-4 months rewrite with Rayalaseema backdrop and movie got set.
Original setting the faction backdrop was in lighter vein in Deenraj’s original story
Jayanth took care of Venky’s styling in the movie with checkered shirts and everything.
Jayanth saw Angela’s photo in Filmfare magazine and then did a 3 day screen test in Hyderabad and it was a unanimous decision that she was the right choice. 99% of the movie she wears a white dress to show the purity in the character.
Mahesh Madhavan was the original music composer and Mani Sharma worked for him as a keyboard player. Unfortunately Mahesh Mahadevan got cancer during the shoot and was in the hospital and since Jayanth already had good rapport with Mani, he asked to finish the rest of the album. First song he composed for the movie was Meghale Thakindi. Out of respect for Mahesh, Mani Sharma asked that his name not be in the credits.

They started filming and the first scene they shot was the love letter little hearts biscuit scene. It ended at 4:30 PM in the afternoon and everyone was shocked
They filmed in Kurnool and Kadiri and it was a huge challenge due to the climate extremely hot sun, equipment handling, and crowd control. It was a tough thing to manage but they accomplished it.
They filmed the songs in Switzerland and Amsterdam, ooty and Kashmir.

Movie release day they watched it in a mass movie theater and there was no response for the interval. 2nd half had a great response and climax got claps.
Movie was declared a hit and Jayanth got tears and called his wife. Nobody in the industry believed in him but he delivered a classic with his first movie
Breakthrough for Anjala Zhaveri, Jayaprakash Reddy, Srihari, and Mani Sharma. Venkatesh career took a turning point and started the path towards becoming the ultimate family hero of Telugu cinema
Box office it collected 12 crores share overall, blockbuster at the box office. In Vizag, ran for full shows for 120+ days, RTC X Roads 70 lakhs gross, created an all time record at the time for running for 50 days in more than 100 centers, first movie to run in 6 centers for more than 100 days in Andhra Pradesh.

Revisiting Preminchukundam Raa (1997): Review + Interesting Facts