Legend (2014 film)
Legend is a 2014 Indian Telugu-language political action drama film written and directed by Boyapati Srinu. The film stars Nandamuri Balakrishna in a dual role alongside Jagapathi Babu, Sonal Chauhan and Radhika Apte. It was produced by 14 Reels Entertainment, Renny Johnson and Varahi Chalana Chitram. The film has music composed by Devi Sri Prasad. The film released on 28 March 2014 worldwide. Upon release, the film received highly positive reviews from critics and went on to become the fourth-highest grossing film of 2014 in Telugu. The film received unanimous praise for the performances of  Balakrishna and Babu in addition to the music, dialogues and direction. Plot. The film starts in 1989 where Jeetendra and his father, a ruthless don in Kurnool are in Vizag to meet Jitendra's proposed bride, the daughter of the local MLA. During their return, Jeetendra accidents an aged man and also shoots a bystander who asked him to come out of the car. So, they both, along with their henchmen, are taken to the local landlord who lives with his family, consisting of his mother; wife, who is a college lecturer; sister ; brother-in-law; their children; son Jaidev  (who is in his teens), daughter; and his trusted accomplice Raghavaiah. The landlord asks Jitendra to apologize to the injured persons and asks him to pay compensation. This hurts Jitendra's ego and he insults the people calling them as poor. The landlord angrily slaps him and gets him arrested, and thus, Jitendra vows to take revenge. Jitendra's father then kidnaps the landlord's wife and Jaidev, and forces him to take back the complaint. Jitendra is released and he goes to the place where they are held captive. Much to his shock, he sees his father and many  of their henchmen killed. One henchmen then reveals that Ramaraju had killed Jaidev's mother because he had hurt their ego and in rage Jaidev kills mostly all of them. Thus their enmity gets permanent. Back in the landlord's house, Jaidev's grandmother fears that he might be killed like his great-grandfather, grandfather and uncle, so she tells them to stop all this enmity. Meanwhile, Jitendra wants to take revenge and his anger rises day by day and he settles in Vizag along with all their henchmen and also kills his father in law as he tried to  stop him. Jitendra kills the landlord and this prompts Sujatha Kumar to send Krishna to Dubai. The story shifts forward to present 2014, where Krishna, is in Dubai where he saves a bunch of Indian girls to be sold in flesh trade and is planning to come back in Vizag along with his girlfriend Sneha and Guru Manikyam to set talks about their marriage in India. When he returns to India, on the way from the airport, he saves a dock worker who was an ex-MLA from the hands of Jeetendra's elder son, Chotu (Sravan) and his henchmen  as they wanted to kill him, so that no evidence could be left for their pending cases. Krishna thrashes them badly, and this is noticed by two of Jaidev's former accomplices.He then meets with Sneha's father, who is the local District Collector.Meanwhile, Chotu and the ex-MLA are both admitted to the same hospital. .Chotu knows about this and goes to kill him, but in mysterious circumstances gets killed himself. The police, under the payroll of Jitendra, headed by a corrupt ACP, view the CCTV footage which show that the same person was present at both  the spots. Enraged he finds about Krishna and goes to kill him. At the temple he shoots him and orders his second son and henchmen to kill the whole family including Sneha, but at the right time they are saved by Jaidev, elder brother of Krishna. Jaidev then kills all the henchmen and Jitendra's second son and the ACP and threatens the current MLA to face severe consequences if Jeetendra is not in control. He also reveals that it was him who killed Chotu in the hospital and not Krishna. During the funeral of Jeetendra's sons, MLA tells  Jaidev's story to Jitendra's youngest son, and says that he has a dangerous past. The story then shifts to 1999, where Jitendra wanted to make his brother Ajay the MLA and killed the local MP for not giving the party ticket due to his criminal nature. Jaidev, along with his accomplices, then thrashes him personally and gets Jitendra arrested. He is meanwhile separated from his family by his grandmother, as he had not obeyed her orders and continues to fight for the poor. His cousin Radhika falls in love with him, and Jaidev reluctantly accepts her love. Jaidev  saves his sister from child abortion and slaps his brother-in-law in front of everyone and tells the importance of women in our society. He also threatens a state union minister from Delhi, who wants to make Jeetendra Chief Minister. Ajay kidnaps Krishna. Jaidev goes to Jeetendra's house and saves his brother Krishna and kills Ajay and many of his henchmen. He threatens Jeetendra to leave Vizag and never to show his face again. At the railway station in Kurnool, he is then again forced by his most trusted accomplice and right hand to take revenge. Jitendra then  goes back to Vizag, kidnaps Radhika and takes her to a railway yard where he stabs her. Jaidev comes and kills all of the remaining henchmen including Jeetendra's right hand and infuriating Jeetendra (Although, Jeetendra survives the kill and is revived). Radhika dies in Jaidev's arms. His grandmother then exempts him from the family and tells him to never show his face again otherwise she will kill herself. The story then shifts to the present where the MLA advises Jeetendra's third son to go to America in order to avoid Jaidev. In the hospital Jaidev apologizes to  his grandmother as he had shown his face, but she realises her mistake and reunites with Jaidev and orders him to finish Jeetendra. Meanwhile, Jeetendra is planning to become the Chief Minister with the help of a Central Union Minister (who was the state union minister then) and so he plans to bribe all the candidates to get majority seats. Just before the meeting, he learns that Jaidev had called them to a different location where he threatens all the candidates to work for the people. The candidates agree to support Jaidev. Jeetendra comes to the venue and attempts to  kill all the candidates, but are saved by Jaidev. In an ensuing fight, Jaidev kills Jitendra, once and for all and all his henchmen. The story ends with Jaidev declaring the win of good over evil. Music. Music was composed by Devi Sri Prasad. Lyrics were written by Ramajogayya Sastry. Music was released on Lahari Music company. The music director Devi Sri Prasad, teaming up with Boyapati Srinu for the third time after "Bhadra" and "Tulasi", and scoring for the first time for a Balakrishna film There are six tracks in the album. Audio was bought by Lahari Music. The  music was launched on 6 March 2014 at Shilpakala Vedika in Hyderabad with the film's theatrical trailer. Production. Casting. Bollywood actress "Sonal Chauhan" was roped as one of the leading actress. Jagapathi Babu was cast as the antagonist in the film. Kalyani paired up with Jagapathi Babu as his wife. Anil Sunkara confirmed that Radhika Apte was the heroine. Hamsa Nandini appeared in a special song with Balakrishna. Filming. The muhurtham ceremony of the film was held on 3 June 2013 in Hyderabad. The film was supposed to start its shoot in Dubai, but the production team decided to  start off because Some permissions did not come through in time. The regular shooting of the film started in Ramoji Film City on 13 July 2013 at Hyderabad. The introduction scene of the hero was shot under the action choreography of Ram Laxman. A special car chase sequence of the film was shot in the deserts of Dubai and a song was canned on Balakrishna and Sonal Chauhan in this schedule. Release. "Legend" was released worldwide on 28 March 2014 and was shown in 700 theaters across the state and over 1200 theaters worldwide. Box office. Legend ran for 100  days in 31 centres and 175 days in 2 centres. The film completed 200 days run in two centres (Yemmiganur -Direct (Kurnool district), Proddutur(Kadapa District) -Single Shift). The film also completed 275 days run in 2 centers: Yemmiganur -Direct (Kurnool district), Proddutur (Kadapa District – Single Shift). After Muddula Mavayya, Samarasimha Reddy, Narasimha Naidu and Simha 5th film to complete double century. The film completed 365 days run in two theatres in Kurnool district with direct four shows and it also completed 1000 days in Proddutur (56 days in Arveti theatre and 944 days (single shift 4 shows) at Archana theatre