Manmadhudu

Plot

Abhiram (Nagarjuna Akkineni) is a manager in an ad agency, owned by his paternal uncle Prasad (Tanikella Bharani). He despises women and expresses his hatred every minute of every day. But his office is populated by women as it is an ad agency and he has to live with it. Prasad appoints Harika (Sonali Bendre) as the new assistant manager and Abhiram hates to have another female employee in his office. He never leaves an opportunity to belittle her and gradually Harika gets fed up and goes to Chairman Prasad to submit her resignation. Prasad asks her to think about it twice and tells her about Abhiram's past and why he deeply hates women.

Abhi lost his parents when he was too young and his grandfather brings him up. He was the only heir to their family business and enjoys life in his own way. He meets and falls in love with Maheswari (Anshu), who is the niece of an employee (Chandra Mohan) in Abhi's grandfather's company. Alarmed that he will just play with her and leave her, Maheshwari's uncle takes her away to his hometown and arranges her engagement with another man. Abhi goes there and tries to bring Maheswari with him assuring her uncle that he is going to marry her. But on the way to his grandfather's home, they meet with a serious accident. When Abhi returns to his consciousness, his grandfather tells him that Maheswari married another person and shows him the invitation card. Abhi feels cheated and starts to hate all the women and thinks that they all are superficial and treacherous.

After listening this, Harika feels sympathy towards Abhi's pain and his child like mind. She decides to stay with the company and Prasad promotes her as manager and demotes Abhi as assistant manager for some time. Though infuriated, Abhi has no choice but stay and goes with her to Paris on a business trip. There they become close and Harika helps him with his phobia of water. Abhi starts to fall for Harika but is disappointed and distances himself from her when she reveals that she is engaged to be married.

After they come back to India, Abhi behaves in a childish manner to get over his disappointment. Harika reciprocates his feelings but is confused about getting married as Abhi won't express his feelings. Meanwhile, Abhi's aunt reveals that Maheswari actually died in the accident they were in and they hid that information fearing that Abhi might not come out of the shock of that news. Abhi realizes it was foolish of him to hate women but is too shocked to express his feelings to Harika. At last Harika dares and tells him that this marriage was her parents choice not hers, indirectly indicating that she was ready to come to him if he asks. Prasad comes to know that Abhi and Harika have feelings for each other and encourages Abhi to go and get her. Finally he asks her to marry him and she breaks her previous engagement and marries him.

Reception

The movie received highly positive critical feedback. Particularly, Akkineni Nagarjuna, Trivikram Srinivas and Devi Sri Prasad received rave reviews for their respective works in this film. Popular reviewing website Idlebrain rated 4.5 out of 5 stating "When director and hero have latest hits behind their back, the comparison is inevitable. This film is definitely better than Santosham (Nagarjuna's earlier film). Manmadhudu is as good as Nuvvu Naaku Nachav (Vijaya Bhaskar's earlier film). First half of the film is extremely entertaining (total comedy + flashback romance). And second half (comedy + story) is even better than first half. 95% of the scenes in the film are comedy dialogues. There are few sentiment scenes. But these very few sentiment scenes are bound to leave impact on you. Nagarjuna dominated the show and won accolades from audiences. It's a must recommended hilarious film for all Telugu film lovers." Another popular reviewing website Sify gave an extremely positive review and wrote "Though the story is wafer thin, the director has been able to package the film well with an innovative presentation. Nagarjuna and Sonali are excellent and have played their roles with conviction. The music of Devi Sri Prasad is hummable. The film is out to wallop some fun ‘n’ frolic.", giving a verdict that it is a "Rip-Roaring Entertainer". Another reviewing website fullhyd.com gave a positive review stating "Nagarjuna lends significantly to the character of Abhiram in one of his slickest cinematic performances ever. He perfectly captures the liveliness, complexity and frustration of Abhiram. Unquestionably, Manmathudu proves to be an enthralling vehicle for his crowd-pleasing comeback. Sonali gives a commendable performance as a young and struggling art director who is in love with Abhiram. Devi Sri Prasad's romantic and sometimes ominous musical score nicely complements the images on screen. The dialogues, penned by Trivikram, are chronically mind-boggling. Manmathudu gratifies on many levels. The direction maintains pace and intrigue, the performances are spot on, and the locations are simply sumptuous, be it Smokey Alps or a clean Hyderabad road. All things considered, if you can stomach the thirty minutes of echoing flashback, Manmathudu makes for one intense and rousing entertainment, and if you're on its quirky wavelength, it might just strike you as one of the funniest movies you've ever seen!"

Soundtrack

The acclaimed music for this movie was composed by Devi Sri Prasad. The audio was released on 6 December 2002. An audio release function was held at an open dais erected outside glass house in Annapurna Studios. While popular Telugu singer Sunitha anchored the event, the music director of the film Devi Sri Prasad performed some of the songs from the movie. The guests who attended the event include Nagarjuna, director K. Vijaya Bhaskar, lyricist Seetharama Sastry, actors Brahmanandam and Tanikella Bharani.

Addressing the fans, Nagarjuna said "I saw the complete movie yesterday and it came out really well. I can assure you that 'Manmadhudu' would become a super duper hit."

All songs are composed by Devi Sri Prasad. Five out of six songs had lyrics by Sirivennela Sitaramasastri. Music released was on SOHAN Music Company. Often being termed as one of Devi Sri Prasad's finest works, the music got rave reviews and went out to become a huge success commercially.