After his MS in US, Sekhar Kammula joined the prestigious film school at Howard University. He learnt techniques of lighting, cinematography, editing and direction.In 1999, His love for cinema drew him back to Hyderabad after a brief stint in IT industry in US. He joined Citicorp made a feature film, Dollar Dreams with a budget of 20 Lakhs under his own Amigos Creations banner. The film has famous director Raghavender Rao’s son, Prakash Kovelamudi in the lead role. The film won so much of critical acclaim and also got him the National Award for the Best debut director for the film.
His second film, Anand has Raja and Kamalini Mukherjee in the lead roles. The movie was a blockbuster and brought first commercial success to Sekhar Kammula. 50% of the movie budget was funded from National Film Development Counsel.His second film, Godavari starring Sumanth and Kamalini Mukherjee was also appreciated for its content but is a moderate success commercially. After a brief break, Sekhar Kammula made a film ‘Happy Days’ with all new comers. Initially the film has no takers and Sekhar Kammula had to sell it for a very less amount to Dil Raju. The film was distributed across the world by Dil Raju and after its release, the film became a rage for College students across the state. The film went on to become one of the biggest hits that year.
Sekhar Kammula with his next film, Leader introduced Daggubati scion Rana to Tollywood. Unlike Sekhar Kammula’s previous films, Leader has a political backdrop. The film became decent launch pad for Rana and was an average grosser. After ‘Leader’, Kammula took a gap of two years before coming up with his next film – ‘Life is beautiful’.But unfortunately he delivered a dud. Later he attempted his first ever remake with Anaamika starring Nayantara. The movie is the remake of Bollywood blockbuster,Kahaani but it could not change the fortunes of Kammula. Anaamika is also the first ever remake in Sekhar Kammula’s career.
