Neelakanta (director)

Neelakanta
Neelakanta in 2018
Born
G. Neelakanta Reddy[1]

Kadapa, Andhra Pradesh, India
Alma materLoyola College, Vijayawada
OccupationsDirector, screenwriter, producer
Years active1988–present

Neelakanta is an Indian film director and screenwriter who works predominantly in Telugu films director. He has received the National Award in the screenwriting for the feature Show.[2] He won two National Film Awards and three Nandi Awards.[3]

Personal life

Neelakanta is a native of Kadapa, Andhra Pradesh.[1] He studied at Loyola Public School and Loyola College in Vijayawada. Since his school days, Neelakanta has had a deep love for film direction and film making which is what drove him to Chennai after his graduation.

Career

Neelakanta worked as an assistant to Vallabhaneni Janardhan for Thodu Needa (1983) and Amayaka Chakravarthy (1983), both of which were remakes and flops. He made his debut as a producer for Jamadagni (1988) since he was a fan of Bharathiraja. He then worked on Priyanka (1994), the Tamil remake of Damini (1993). He then took a hiatus as all of the offers that he was receiving were for remakes and he wanted to make something original.[1][4] He always wanted to make films which eloquently depicted the psychological study of characters for the off-beat[5] his passion materialised with Show[6] followed by Missamma. He received two national awards, one for Best Screenplay and the other for the Best Feature Film in Telugu for Show while state Nandi Award in the screenplay department for the latter.

He then made Sada Mee Sevalo, with Shriya Saran and Venu Thottempudi in lead roles,[7] and later made a psychological thriller, Nandanavanam 120km. Both these films did not do well at the box office. Despite its commercial failure, Nanadanavanam got him huge critical acclaim.[8] These were followed by Mr.Medhavi. with Genelia and Raja in the lead roles. This film, produced by RamaRao Bodduluri, proved to be an above-average grosser. He also wrote dialogues for a Telugu remake of the Hindi hit A Wednesday!, entitled Eeenadu. In 2011, Neelakanta directed Virodhi, featuring Meka Srikanth and Kamalinee Mukherjee. Neelakanta secured the best dialogue writer award in the year 2011 for this film. In 2013 he directed Chammak Challo, which gathered bad reviews for both the director and the film.[9][10]

In 2018, he directed the Malayalam film Zam Zam starring Manjima Mohan. The film is an official remake of the Hindi film Queen.

Filmography

  • Note: All films are in Telugu, unless otherwise noted.
Year Film Director Writer Producer Language Notes
1988JamadagniNoNoYesTelugu
1994 PriyankaYesScreenplayYes Tamil
2002 ShowYesYesNoTelugu Winner - two National Film Awards
2003 MissammaYesYesNo Winner - Nandi Award for Best Screenplay Writer
2005 Sadaa Mee SevaloYesYesNo
2006 Nandanavanam 120kmYesYesYes
2008 Mr. MedhaviYesYesNo
2009 EenaduNoDialoguesNo
2011 VirodhiYesYesNo Screened at International Film Festival of India – 2011
Winner - Two Nandi Awards 2011
Screened at Melbourne International Film Festival-2011[11]
2013 Chammak ChalloYesYesNo
2014 MaayaYesYesNo[12][13]
2023 CircleYesYesNo
TBAZam ZamYesYesNoMalayalam

Awards

National Film Awards
Nandi Awards

References

  1. 1 2 3 Jeevi (23 May 2006). "Interview with Neelakanta by Jeevi". Idlebrain. Retrieved 2 March 2025.
  2. ↑ "Awards of Neelakanta". Cine Radham. Archived from the original on 2 March 2014.
  3. ↑ "నంది అవార్డు విజేతల పరంపర (1964–2008)" [A series of Nandi Award Winners (1964–2008)] (PDF) (in Telugu). Information & Public Relations of Andhra Pradesh. Retrieved 21 August 2020.
  4. ↑ Sri (28 June 2006). "Interview with Neelakantha". Telugu Cinema. Archived from the original on 19 November 2006. Retrieved 2 March 2025.
  5. ↑ "Directors show all the way". Idlebrain.
  6. ↑ "Review". Fully hyderabad.
  7. ↑ "Sada mee sevalo is a dud". Rediff.
  8. ↑ "120 km away from routine flicks". cinegoer.
  9. ↑ "writer sleeping under tree". tupaki.
  10. ↑ "Nothing flashy about this". 123 telugu. 15 February 2013.
  11. ↑ "IFFM neglected Telugu films". sisi enterprises. Archived from the original on 21 February 2015.
  12. ↑ "For 'Maaya', Harshvardhan Rane follows caveman's diet". CNN-IBN. 17 January 2014. Archived from the original on 25 May 2014. Retrieved 25 May 2014.
  13. ↑ "Maaya is Neelakanta's new film". action cut. Retrieved 3 March 2014.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (link)
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