Thanks to record breaking success of SS Rajamouli’s RRR, its lead stars Jr NTR & Ram Charan, who are massive stars in the southern part of India have now gained nationwide fame. 

While RRR marks Jr NTR’s first big screen introduction to the Hindi speaking belts, Ram Charan had earlier tried to penetrate into the Hindi market in 2013 and the SS Rajamouli directorial is his reintroduction of sorts. 

9 years before RRR, Ram Charan had made his Bollywood debut with the 2013 film Zanjeer co-starring Priyanka Chopra, Sanjay Dutt and Prakash Raj. 

© Prakash Mehra Productions

Directed by Apoorva Lakhia of Shootout At Lokhandwala fame, Zanjeer was an official remake of Amitabh Bachchan’s breakout film of the same name that released in 1973. 

While the original Salim-Javed written film turned Amitabh Bachchan into an overnight sensation, the remake unfortunately put a brake on Ram Charan’s career in Bollywood. 

Made on a huge budget of Rs 60 crore, Zanjeer in Hindi could only collect a poor Rs 13 crore and was termed a disaster by trade.  

It released alongside Sushant Singh Rajput and Parineeti Chopra’s Shuddh Desi Romance. The much smaller film was made on a budget of Rs 25 crore & collected Rs 46.26 crore. The Yash Raj Films venture was termed a hit at the box office. 

Interestingly, Zanjeer was a Hindi-Telugu bilingual film. Its Telugu version was titled Thoofan. Reportedly, Thoofan turned out to be a box office success.  

After tasting failure the first time around in Hindi belts, Ram Charan is now basking in the blockbuster success of his latest film.  

© DVV Entertainment

Reportedly, the film has collected over Rs 900 crore in under two weeks of its release and will soon go past Rs 1000 crore mark to become only the third film in the history of Indian cinema to achieve such a feat.

View the full article