K. Vishwanath, A Telugu Legendary Director Options

[swarapriya]

K. Vishwanath - A Telugu Legendary Director

Vishwanath is a distinguished director of Telugu film industry who also made himself name with several good Hindi movies. For a long time, he was an assistant to the Telugu film director Adurti Subba Rao (director of “Doli” starring Rajesh Khanna). He got a major break with Annapurna Studio’s home production in 1965 as a director for the film “Aatma Gowravam”. Even though the movie was not a money spinner, it didn’t loose its investments.

From that time onwards Vishwanath started making movies on a regular basis, some of them big hits. But not until 1980’s his full potential was realized. This started with “Shankarabharanam” which dealt with disappearing classical music of India. This movie fetched him President’s Gold Medal as the best picture for that year. In 1985 he made “Saptapadi” which dealt with intercast marriage issues. He also made “Swati Mutyam” the same year that dealt with an adult with a child’s mind and how he deals with struggles in his life. He made a movie in 1986, “Sirivennela”, that dealt with a deaf woman’s relationship with a blind man. The film “Swayam Krishi” made in 1987 dealt with issues related to work attitudes. He continued to make other fine movies through rest of the 80’s and into 90’s. Currently he only makes movies occasionally. Instead he has diverted his efforts into acting.

Some of Vishwanath’s Hindi movies include “Sargam”, “Kaam Chor”, and “Eeshwar”. Altogether he directed 55 movies. Of these 44 were in Telugu, one was in Tamil, and ten were in Hindi. In 1985 alone, he made three Hindi movies and two Telugu movies! His complete filmography as a director is shown below (H is for Hindi and T is for Tamil in the table).

Most of the albums from the period when Vishwanath found his groove and hit the stride are currently available in the marketplace in one form or another. It is the early albums that everyone has problems procuring them. Recently a friend of mine gave several albums including now “never to be found again” LPs that cover some of this early work. I will try to share as much of this music as possible through this thread provided there is enough interest.

Because of the popularity it has gained, and being considered to be a landmark achievement in Telugu cinema history, I will start with uploading songs of “Shankarabharanam” first.

[swarapriya]

Seetamaalakshmi (1978)

This movie starred Rameshwari. This was her second movie. Her first and the debut movie was the Hindi film, "Dulhan Wohi Jo Piya Man Bhai". It was a huge hit. The Telugu movie was released on the heels of "Dulhan" movie release. The Telugu movie also became a huge hit.

The story goes that, Rameshwari, who hails from Andhra Pradesh and a Telugu native, when graduated from the acting school had offers to act in both of these movies. She signed for both of them. Hindi movie had a head start and was released few months before the Telugu movie. Rameshwari had the distinction of making a mark as one of the first Telugu person to impress in a Hindi movie. Most of the actresses after working in Telugu movies went to act in Hindi movies when the opportunities came. In Rameshwari's case it was the other way around.

With so much promise, and such a fine start, one expected great things from Rameshwari. Unfortunately for her, while shooting for another Hindi movie, she met with an accident and was sidelined for a long time. After that she could never make a successful comeback. Few years ago she was seen in another Telugu movie called "Nijam".

This movie also was a departure in actor Satya Narayana's acting career. Even though he made his debut as a hero, until this movie came along he invariably played the same role in all the movies, as a villain. Director Vishwanath, going against the grain, offered him a role that called for histroinics of a character actor. After the success of this movie, Satya Narayana went on to play many more such character roles. This story parallels that of that great Hindi actor Pran. In the film "Upkaar", director Manoj Kumar offered Pran to play a poor one-legged farmer who until that time was noted to play baddie roles. When "Upkaar" became a huge hit, Pran went on to play in many more movies as a character actor.

This movie once again teams up KV awith KV. The results predictably are superb. I am uploading all the songs except for one. The missing song is shown in red italics in the table below. This song is a second version of the song Suseela sang that I am uploading. If you can, please share the missing song with rest of us.

Here are the songs ...

This post has been edited by swarapriya: Jul 9 2009, 11:30 PM

[venkat]

Seetamaalakshmi (1978)

This movie starred Rameshwari. This was her second movie. Her first and the debut movie was the Hindi film, "Dulhan Wohi Jo Piya Man Bhai". It was a huge hit. The Telugu movie was released on the heels of "Dulhan" movie release. The Telugu movie also became a huge hit.

The story goes that, Rameshwari, who hails from Andhra Pradesh and a Telugu native, when graduated from the acting school had offers to act in both of these movies. She signed for both of them. Hindi movie had a head start and was released few months before the Telugu movie. Rameshwari had the distinction of making a mark as one of the first Telugu person to impress in a Hindi movie. Most of the actresses after working in Telugu movies went to act in Hindi movies when the opportunities came. In Rameshwari's case it was other way round.

With so much promise, and such a fine start, one expected great things from Rameshwari. Unfortunately for her, while shooting for another Hindi movie, she met with an accident and was sidelined for a long time. After that she could never make a successful comeback. Few years ago she was seen in another Telugu movie called "Nijam".

This movie also was a departure in actor Satya Narayan's acting career. Even though he made his debut as a hero, until this movie came along he invariably played the same role in all the movies, a villain. Director Vishwanath, going against the grain, offered him a role that called for histroinics of a character actor. After the success of this movie, Satya Narayana went onto play many more such character roles. This story parallels that of that great Hindi actor Pran. In the film "Upkaar", director Manoj Kumar offered Pran to play a poor one-legged farmer. When "Upkaar" became a huge hit, Pran went onto play in many more movies as a character actor.

This movie once again teams up KV awith KV. The results predictably are superb. I am uploading all the songs except for one. The missing song is shown in red italics in the tyable below. This song is a second version of the song Suseela sang that I am uploading. If you can, please share the missing song with rest of us.

Here are the songs ...

The male singer in "Chaalu Chaalu Ee Virahalu" is Ramakrishna Das, the nephew of P.Sushila. The female singer sounds like B.Vasanta. Could be even a Swarnalata of the sixties/seventies and not later.

Venkat

This post has been edited by venkat: Jul 9 2009, 10:21 AM