Super Star (2002 film)

Super Star
DVD Cover
Directed by	Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar
Written by	Upendra
Screenplay by	Upendra
Produced by	Hanumantha Inambar
Starring	Upendra Keerthi Reddy
Cinematography	V R Krishna Kumar
Music by	Hamsalekha
Production company	Prince Productions
Release date	2002
Running time	130 minutes
Country	India
Language	Kannada

Super Star is a 2002 Kannada film written by Upendra and directed by Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar, starring Upendra and Keerthi Reddy. The story line was loosely based on the Nepalese royal massacre involving Dipendra of Nepal, the tragedy that struck the family of the Nepal king. Nagathihalli Chandrashekhar had mentioned in an interview that, although he was credited as the director, he was not given much freedom on the sets and Upendra was the one who directed most of the movie. The film had four climaxes that viewers could select on their own. It was dubbed into Telugu as Stupid, which was surprisingly a lot more successful than the Kannada version.

Cast

• Upendra as Dipendra of Nepal / rock star Ricky
• Keerthi Reddy as Devyani Rana

Sound Track

The music for the movie was composed and by Hamsalekha. The lyrics were penned by Upendra. The track named Thagole Thagole was a chartbuster.

Title	Singers
Bhakra bhakra	Hemanth Kumar, Shweta Malviya
Rajkumar Rajkumar	Hariharan
Thagole Thagole	Shankar Mahadevan
Antu Antu	Nanditha, Sonu Nigam
Thumba Thumba	Hariharan
Problem	Hemanth Kumar
Bittaku Bittaku	Adnan Sami & Humming by Shweta Malviya

Critical reception

The reaction from the critics turned out to be mostly negative upon the film's release. While the performances of the lead artistes, unique story line of the film, soundtrack, background music and other technical aspects of the film were praised, the screenplay of the film was the most criticized by the critics as well as the audiences.

Box office

Karnataka

Superstar had an extremely strong opening at the box office across Karnataka similar to the earlier record breaking openers of Upendra and set the box office on fire during its opening weekend. The film continued to storm the box office during its initial weeks, but failed to live up to the expectations and most of the fans were disappointed by the movie. Superstar ended up becoming a below average grosser in Karnataka by running only for 6 weeks in its main centre in Bangalore. The film was sold to distributors at a very high distribution price and got an extraordinary opening in its initial weeks, thus returning investment for the producer. Compared to Upendra's earlier blockbuster movies like A, Upendra, Preethse, H2O, this film was considered as average hit as it returned investment for the producer.

Andhra Pradesh

The Telugu version of Superstar which was released in Andhra Pradesh in 2003 (a year after its original Kannada release) was titled as Stupid - O Pichi Vadi Prema Katha and had a fantastic opening across Andhra Pradesh, owing mainly to Upendra's loyal Telugu fan following which he had gained due to the large success of the Telugu versions of his earlier blockbuster movies like A and Upendra (film) which not only starred him but were also directed by him, and a few straight Telugu movies like Raa and Kanyadanam which were box office hits. Although Superstar was just an average grosser in Karnataka, Stupid surprisingly turned out to be a hit in Andhra Pradesh by completing 100 days of run and its distributors in Andhra Pradesh earned fair profits from the movie.

See also

• Nepalese royal massacre
• Dipendra of Nepal
• Devyani Rana