Will it be a tough luck to recover 55 Crores investment made on a film with Balakrishna as hero? The obvious answer would be ‘Yes’ because Balayya was never a reliable hero when it comes to main stream commercial cinema or experimenting with new backdrops? With such inconsistency on track, what made producer Rajiv Reddy and Bibo Srinu to invest Rs. 55 Crores budget on ‘Gauthami Puthra Satakarni?’
‘It is the meritorious content we believed in. The era of Satavahanas is an untouched genre in history. Rather than depending on grandeur and strong visual impact, we worked huge on compiling the content with emotional impact. Purity and affectionate bond between Hema Malini as mother and Balayya as son; Shriya Saran as wife besides Balakrishna will add the actual conceptual depth to our making. We started off with 55 Crores budget initially and wrapping up the whole film within stipulated budget,’ informed producer Rajiv Reddy.
Historical projects with untouched backdrops are hard to handle because costs may escalate and working days may go up and down. But, director Krish seems to have set an excellent example in keeping the budget estimates and actual expenditure go hand in hand.