Bhaagamathie

Bhaagamathie
Telugu release poster
Directed by	G. Ashok
Produced by	V. Vamsi Krishna Reddy Pramod
Written by	G. Ashok
Starring	Jayaram Anushka Shetty Unni Mukundan Asha Sarath
Music by	S. Thaman
Cinematography	Sushil Choudhary R. Madhi[1]
Edited by	Kotagiri Venkateswara Rao
Production company	UV Creations
Release date	26 January 2018 (2018-01-26)
Running time	138 minutes
Country	India
Language	Telugu Tamil.
Budget	₹20 crore (US$2.8 million)
Box office	₹69 crore (US$9.6 million)

Bhaagamathie is a 2018 Indian horror thriller film written and directed by G. Ashok. It stars Jayaram In the title role alongside Anushka Shetty in the lead role, with Unni Mukundan, Aadhi, and Asha Sarath in other pivotal roles.^[2] The film revolves around a woman imprisoned in a haunted house while she is interrogated by law enforcers investigating a politician they suspect of corruption. Principal photography commenced in June 2016 in Hyderabad, and the film released on 26 January 2018 in Telugu and Tamil along with a dubbed Malayalam version.^[3][4]

Although, upon release the film received mixed feedback from critics who praised Anushka Shetty's performance but criticised the screenplay and length of the film. Overall, the film received positive audience response.^[5] With Bhaagamathie, Anushka Shetty emerges the second Indian actress after Sridevi to have a $1 Million grosser at the USA Box Office.^[6] The film was later dubbed into Hindi with the same title for television release on Zee Cinema on 1 July 2018 with Anushka Shetty's voice dubbed by Toshi Sinha. The film was a critical and commercial success.

Plot

The film starts with a scene depicting many people being killed mysteriously. The film then cuts to Eswar Prasad (Jayaram) a politician who vows to resign from his post if the government fails to recover idols which were stolen over a period of 6 months. This wins the hearts of the masses. It also troubles his political rivals, who forge a plan to destroy his credibility with the help of CBI joint director Vaishnavi Natarajan (Asha Sarath) and Assistant Commissioner of Police Sampath (Murali Sharma). The two of them plan to interrogate IAS Chanchala (Anushka Shetty), a close confidante of Prasad who’s in jail for murdering her fiancé, Shakhti (Unni Mukundan). To not arouse suspicion, they decide to shift her to Bhaagamathie Bungalow for the interrogation. Suddenly, a street lamp explodes and Lingamurthy (Dhanraj) screams. The locals are afraid of the Bungalow and claim that it is haunted. As she's left alone in the haunted house, she walks into one eerie room after another peering through dust-laden windows, rickety staircases and shows no fear of having to be in this strange place. A book and larger-than-life paintings foretell a story of Queen Bhaagamathie. Spirits take control of her and IAS Chanchala transforms into an unrecognizable person. Day by day chanchala show character of ghost bagamathie possessed. Bagamathie is told as lived in ancient and killed all evil doers. Finally the evil doers united and killed, locked in this bagamathie palace. CBI tried to question on the third day, here bagamathie tells she was cheated by chandrasenan who was chief soldier of desire to become the king. She supported chandrasenan because he acted as a noble person but cheated her and locked her in the palace. CBI goes away and tells Sampath that she needs psychiatric treatment. But Sampath tells chanchala maybe playing drama to escape. Sampath sees CCTV visual showing chanchala possessed. Sampath brings a swamy who tells if a dark ball kept near vigraha turns black and if a sandal liquid gives bad smell, then ghost is there. So next day Sampath goes at night and finds the ball turned black and the sandal with bad smell. Sampath sees chanchala hit her left hand onto wall with a hammer onto a pin. This makes Sampath, the elder brother of shakthi who wants chanchala punished for killing shakthi, now takes chanchala to mental hospital.Eshwar Prasad comes to visit her in the mental asylum. Eshwar Prasad tells that her acting as Queen Bhaagamathie was awesome then he tells thanks for saving him from CBI so he offers her 300 crores from 1800 crore profit for a business deal which needs evacuate a village from the living people as a commission. Eshwar is asked by other members that putting full amount in Chanchala's bank account is risk because Chanchala can find out real things and create problems once released from jail once Shakthi's murder case is closed with no evidence. Eshwar tells he will get Chanchala to signature the papers to avoid any difficult situation. Eshwar gets signature from Chanchala. Eshwar on opening the paper finds sign as Bhaagamathie. Eshwar now threatens Chanchala who tells he killed her husband at close by for getting the village deal for the business. The scene changes and a flashback of villagers shifting from their village is shown. When a bag sac of money trips off from one man's bag showing cash coming out. Shakthi interfere and tells nobody shall shift till a clear deal. As money given by government comes as DD or cheque. Shakthi beats one government ranked officer and calls Chanchala for finding out why this type of early shifting is asked for and why 8 extra villages have been added to list when they're not going to get drowned under dam project. Chanchala gets out of Eshwar Prasad's office to Sthanhi area. Here furious Shakthi keeps beating the officer, Chanchala tells him to stop. By this time Eshwar arrives and shows video of his goons attacking and killing village people. And tells Chanchala that in order to stop the attack Chanchala has to shoot Shakthi. Shakthi grief struck pulls the trigger from Chanchala's hand and gets killed. With this flashback ends. Eshwar Prasad tries to kill her but, Sampath encountered him. Everyone was released and the culprits were arrested. When Sampath and Vaishnavi Natarajan questioned her why she had not answered their questions directly, she told them that now a days people trust spirits more than people. Amused they tell her that they thought they knew everything about her but they never knew she was a great magician in her childhood and that she knew Arabic. To which Chanchala says that she doesn't know Arabic which shocks them. It also that indicates that there really is the ghost of Bhaagamathie.

Cast

• Anushka Shetty as Bhaagamathie and Chanchala (Telugu version) / Sanchala (Tamil version),(voice over by Sowmya Sharma)
• Jayaram as Easwar Prasad
• Unni Mukundan as Shakthi
• Asha Sarath as Vaishnavi Natarajan, Joint Director, CBI
• Prabhas Sreenu as Subba Reddy
• Dhanraj as Lingamurthy / Lingusamy
• Murali Sharma as ACP Sampath, Shakthi’s elder brother
• Thalaivasal Vijay as a psychiatrist
• Vidyullekha Raman as Police Sub-Inspector7
• Nagineedu as a CBI Officer
• Devadarshini as Kanchana
• Ravi Raja Maguluri as Ajay

Production

G. Ashok, who had previously worked on Pilla Zamindar (2011) and Sukumarudu (2013), readied the Bhaagamathie script in 2012 and had written it keeping Anushka Shetty in mind. In late 2012, the team approached Anushka and the actress liked the script but was not able to immediately commit to the film, as she had pending projects such as Baahubali: The Beginning (2015) and Rudhramadevi (2015), where she also played warrior princesses. The film was later delayed when Anushka chose to star in Lingaa (2014), attempt an ambitious size-shifting role in Size Zero (2015) and complete her portions for Baahubali: The Conclusion (2017). Ashok subsequently chose to wait for her, rather than cast a new actress and refined the script during the waiting period. Early media reports claimed that the film would be based on the Hindi queen Bhagmati, but the makers denied this and revealed that the film would be a "social drama".^[7][8] The film's title is derived from the Bagmati river that flows through Nepal, while Ashok also stated that the titled was also inspired by the fact that Hyderabad was formed in the name of Bhagamathi or Bhagi Nagara.^[9] Once she began working on the film in 2016, she shed 20 kilograms through a rigorous diet plan to portray her character of an IAS Officer.^[10][11] Produced by UV Creations in Telugu and Studio Green in Tamil, the film was primarily shot in Telugu, with some scenes reshot for Tamil audiences. A dubbed Malayalam version of the film was also prepared to have a simultaneous release with the other two versions.^[12]

Release

The satellite rights of the film's Tamil Version were sold to Zee Tamil.^[13]

Soundtrack

The film's music was composed by S. Thaman.

The song "Mandaara" was released as single from the album of Bhaagamathie on 17 February 2018 on the YouTube page of Mango Music, UV Creations. The song was sung by Shreya Ghoshal. The music video of the track features Anushka Shetty and Unni Mukundan. On the same day of release, it was made available for online streaming at Saavn,^[14] Gaana.^[15] and iTunes.^[16] The Tamil version of the song, lyrics by Vivek and sung by Jyotsna Radhakrishnan, was released at a function held by Studio Green in Chennai, which marked four significant events for the producers — the audio launch of Bhaagamathie, a single launch of Iruttu Araiyil Murattu Kuththu (2018), a single launch of Ghajinikanth (2018) and the success meet for Thaanaa Serndha Koottam (2018).^[17][18]

Telugu

Tamil

Reception

Firstpost rated the film 3.5/5, stating "Bhaagamathie is an impressive outing for the whole cast and crew, and it's also a reminder for us that there are plenty of ways to narrate a story despite having a dilapidated house, a ghost, a hapless young woman, and a gut-wrenching backstory. A big thumbs up for the film."^[19] Bollywood Life also rated it 3.5/5 and stated "This is definitely worth a watch. For Anushka Shetty. For the story. and for the two combined."^[20] 123Telugu rated it 3.25/5, writing "On the whole, Bhaagamathie is an engaging thriller with good horror and interesting twists at regular intervals. Anushka leads from the front and will surely pull the crowds with her standout performance. The film is made on a lavish scale and because of this, the thrills look quite good on screen. But the story is familiar and the first half gets a bit slow. If you ignore these aspects, Bhaagamathie ends up a pretty decent watch this weekend. Go for it."^[21] Idlebrain.com rated it 3/5, writing "Bhaagamathie is a kind of film that’s difficult make and difficult to position in Telugu market. Director and production house have packaged the film in such a way that it partly satisfies the people who look for horror elements and the audiences who seek thrill. Despite having a complicated screenplay, Bhaagamathie tries to give something for everybody. Plus points of the film are Anushka, screenplay and background music. On the flipside, the narration should have been true to its genre. On a whole, Bhaagamathie is a well-packaged thriller."^[22] Hindustan Times also rated it 3/5 and wrote "The film draws inspiration from history and adds a dash of supernatural to serve us a crime thriller. After the trailer, many believed that this could be a redux of Anushka’s claim to fame, Arundhati. Instead, G Ashok turns it into a riveting thriller that works wonders despite its flaws. You are on the edge of your seat through most of the film, trying to understand if Chanchala is possessed or not."^[23]

References

External links

• Bhaagamathie on IMDb
• Bhaagamathie on Facebook