Chirutha

Plot

An auto driver (Surya) sees Mattu Bhai (Ashish Vidyarthi) murder a journalist. The auto driver manages to capture Mattu Bhai and his henchmen and hold them until the police arrive. Afterwards, the auto driver returns home to his wife (Pragathi) and son, Charan. Unfortunately, Mattu Bhai and his henchmen break into their house that night. The auto driver is killed and his wife is severely injured. Charan survives uninjured. Charan's mother is in a critical condition, but he and his uncle (Tanikella Bharani) don't have enough money to pay for her operation. The local mafia leader's son has committed murder and offers Charan a deal. In order to pay for his mother's surgery, Charan has to go to prison accepting the crime.

Twelve years later, Charan (Ram Charan) is released from prison. When he meets his uncle again, he finds out that his mother has died. Charan also falls in love with Sanjana (Neha Sharma). Sanjana lives with her father (Prakash Raj), a rich business magnate. Police Officer Ajay (Sayaji Shinde) helps Charan get a passport. Charan plans to go to Bangkok to join a travel agency recommended by his uncle. Sanjana and her friends arrive in Bangkok as tourists. Charan is one of the tour guides. Charan seems to be irritable around Sanjana. Biku (Daniel Balaji) and his henchmen are bothering Sanjana. Charan saves Sanjana by attacking them. A few days later, Biku and his henchmen see Sanjana again. Charan has to fight them again. Charan & Sanjana use a water bike to escape. They get stuck in the middle of the sea when their water bike runs out of gas. When Sanjana wakes up, she sees an island that is a little far away. Charan and Sanjana have to swim to the island.

Charan tells Sanjana that he loves her. Sanjana's father and the other people believe that She is kidnapped by Charan as they find out Charan was in prison for 12 years. He arranges helicopters to search for Sanjana. Charan sees one helicopter in the sky, but Sanjana doesn't want anyone to find them. Sanjana tells Charan that she loves him too and her father would never let her marry him. Charan loves Sanjana, but he didn't expect her to fall in love with him. He reveals that he came to Bangkok to kill Mattu Bhai. Charan found out that Mattu Bhai's a notorious international criminal with network in Hong Kong, Bangkok, and other places has shifted base to Bangkok. Charan tells Sanjana that Biku is none other than Mattu Bhai's son. In Bangkok, Charan tried to kill Mattu Bhai at a bar, but Mattu Bhai escaped and stopped coming to Bangkok. By the time Charan finishes telling his foiled plot to kill Mattu Bhai, a lot of guys in black robes and black suits come, and then a fight starts. Just then, Sanjana's father comes in a helicopter. Seeing her dad, she runs to him and tells him not to hit Charan as he did not kidnap her but saved her. At first Sanjana's father tells to leave him, and the goons leave him, but when Sanjana tells him that she wants him and loves him, her father tells the goons to kill him. The goons hit Charan on the head, he falls down, and they go away. Then, a member of the company for which Charan works searches for him on a boat, finds him, and takes him back. A hot argument takes place between Sanjana and her father, and she runs away to Charan.

Then, Sanjana's father calls Charan and tells him that his mother is still alive. His uncle lied to Charan that his mother died. Sanjana's father will trade Charan's mother for Sanjana. Charan takes Sanjana to a building where he tells her that he is going to trade her for his mother. He tells her that she has her father, but his mother has no one except him. Sanjana's father comes and takes her, and gives Charan his mother back who was grateful to him.

Meanwhile, Mattu Bhai sees the pictures of Charan and Sanjana on television, which was the effort of Sanjana's father to find her, and recognizes Charan as the person who tried to kill him. He tells Biku to kidnap Sanjana, and Biku does the same when the exchange of Sanjana and Charan's mother goes. In the process, gunfire takes place where all the men of the Sanjana's father get shot. Charan also retaliates with a gun and kills some of Biku's men, but Biku gets away with Sanjana. Sanjana's father gets shot in the leg, and in emotion tells Charan that he saw how much he loves his mother and screams that someone is taking away his fiance away, so he reminds him to go and get her. Leaving Sanjana's father in the care of his mother, Charan runs after Biku's car, but fails to get him. One of Biku's men gets to him and gives him a phone, where he talks with Mattu Bhai. The goons take Charan with hands tied, to an island where Mattu Bhaj and Biku are there.

Mattu Bhai, without killing him and Sanjana, as suggested by his son Biku, lets them escape saying he would hunt them, but Charan kills all the men of Mattu and finally kills Biku. Using his body, Charan lures Mattu into his trap. Then, he kills Mattu Bhai, in the same way he killed his father. This is when Mattu Bhai recognizes who Charan is.

Cast

Production

The film had completed its Bangkok schedule and also the Hyderabad schedule. Again the unit left for Bangkok for the final schedule. After the launch and a few days of shooting at Bangkok, the unit returned to Hyderabad. On May 2007, a fight sequence was shot in a huge set was erected at a cost of around Rs 70 lakhs at Annapurna Studios under the supervision of Vijayan. Later, the unit left for Bangkok to continue its shooting there. The introductory song was choreographed at Hyderabad recently under the dance direction of Raghava Lawrence in August.

Soundtrack

Mani Sharma composed the film's soundtrack and score. The audio of the film was released on 22 August. The soundtrack received huge response and cassettes and CDs were sold like hotcakes. The lyrics for Telugu version was penned by Sirivennela, Ramajogayya Sastry, Bhaskarabhatla, Viswa, Kandikonda while Jeyamurasu, Tamil Amuthan, Suthanthirathas penned for Tamil version.

Release

The film was initially slated to release on 22 September but postponed to 29 September. The film released in 708 screens including 532 in Andhra Pradesh, 44 in Karnataka, 4 in Tamil Nadu, 3 in Odisha and 115 overseas. Chirutha collected a first day distributors' share of nearly ₹3.81 crore (US$590,000). In Chennai, it debuted at no. 1 and averaged 100% collections from 3 screens in its opening weekend.

Critical reception

Y. Sunita Chowdary of The Hindu mentioned that: "Chiruta is garnished well with commercial trappings. You’ll find an adequate dose of romance, sentiment and dollops of violence" and praied Charan's performance that he "earn some serious brownie points for effortless dancing and fights". Sify appreciated Charan's performance stating that: "Ram Charan has rendered excellent performance in the dance and stunts departments [..] He looks smart and promising". Idlebrain rated the film 3 out of 5 stating "The first half of the film is alright. The second half slows down a bit. The plus points of the film are Ram Charan Teja, songs and fights. On the flip side a better heroine and a better second half would have done wonders to the film".

Box office

Chirutha collected a share of 12 crores in AP alone for 7 days. The film collected ₹22.08 crore (US$3.4 million)(share) in 50 Days and declared as a Box Office Hit worldwide. Chirutha completed 50 Days in 178 direct centres and 15 other shifted centres. the film completed 100 Days in 40 direct centres.

Dubbed versions and remakes

The film was dubbed into Tamil as Siruthai Puli. On 14 September 2012 the movie was released in the Malayalam dubbed version named Cheetah. It was remade in Bengali as Rangbaaz with Dev and Koel Mallick in the lead.