Baahubali wins big
Baahubali : The Beginning has won the award for the Best Film of 2015 at the National Film Awards. The movie, starring superstar actors like Prabhas, Rana Daggubati, Tamannah Bhatia, Anushka Shetty and many others is considered director SS Rajamouli’s magnum opus. Besides the award for the best film, Baahubali has also won the award for the Best VFX. What makes this victory really special is that this film is the first film from the Telugu film industry in the history of Indian films to win the prestigious award for the best film at the National award. This was the sixty third time the awards were held and they were announced in Delhi at a press conference.
Producers are happy
Being the person who bankrolled this film, Shobhu Yarlagadda could not contain his excitement after the film won these two awards. He tweeted instantly that he feels not only extremely happy but highly honored as well. He was particularly happy with the Jury at the National Film Awards and felt thankful to them and even stated that this is a very special moment for each and every member of the cast and crew as Baahubali’s victory is a great victory for Telugu films in general as they were first team from the industry to win the best picture award. He thanked not only the Jury and the Committee of the National awards but also the Directorate of Film Festivals for the honor. He further thanked and congratulated Srinivas Mohan and his VFX team and each and every cast and crew member for making such an epic and beautiful film. However, even though Baahubali should be a source of a great pride within the Telugu film industry for being the first film from the state to win the Best Film award, not everybody is happy with the decision. Many believe that even though Baahubali was a great film, it was more entertaining and wholesome than it was a true masterpiece. One of the film pundits of Tollywood even commented that the very fact that the film has won only one award other than the Best Film category and that was in the special visual effects category, proves that the film was not as good in quality as many think it is. Many think that Baahubali was more suitable for the ‘Best Popular Movie providing Wholesome Entertainment’ category. Even ‘Sankarabharanam’ which is a classic in Telugu film history did not win the Golden Lotus that is awarded to the Best Film winner even though it had impacted audiences at a national level when it released. A director, who does not want to be named, asserted that Baahubali won because the Jury members were more impressed by the craft of the film than the art.
Sequel coming up
However, with the sequel ‘Baahubali : The Conclusion’ releasing next year and apparently the whole world waiting eagerly for it, criticisms and negative reactions to success shouldn’t bother the makers of the film much because if the sequel is as good as the first one, it is sure to win over both the crowd and jury again.