Winter 1955.
Akkineni Nageswara Rao was leaving from a film shoot to Srinagar, basking under the success of his recently released home production, Dongaramudu . Producer Dukkipati Madhusudana Rao wished to continue with the success streak. A couple of top names cropped up to direct their next venture, but they were found busy. As ANR was about to leave for Srinagar, Madhusudana Rao asked him about the choice of director for Annapurna Pictures next production. ANR wrote in his book, Vandanam Abhivandanam , “soon after reaching Kashmir, I wrote to him about this young editor turned director Adurthi Subbarao whose maiden film, Amarasandesam (1954) impressed me for its neat narration, slick cut and fresh technique.” This Amarnath-Sriranjani-Padmini starrer was a box office cropper but Madhusudana Rao also liked it.
An avid reader of literature, Dukkipati bought the rights of Sarath Chandra Chattopdhyay’s short novel, Nishkriti (Deliverance), the story of three brothers, around their spouses. Retaining the major characters and situations from the original novel, Madhusudana Rao wrote the screenplay along with Adurthi and dialogue writer Acharya Athreya bringing in changes to suit the local sensibilities and titled it, ‘Todikodallu.’ One of the major changes the trio made was – instead of showing the second brother as a lawyer they portrayed him as the caretaker of the elder brother’s agricultural fields in the village.
The Story: Lawyer Kutumbarao and Ramanaiah are brothers. The duo treats their cousin brother Sathyam an idealist as their own sibling. Ramanaiah and his wife Anasuya live in the village. Rao’s wife Annapurna is a chronic patient and Sathyam’s wife Suseela takes care of the family. Jealous of the bonding between Annapurna and Suseela, Anasuya creates a rift between them. Suseela and Sathyam move to the village. Sathyam propounds cooperative farming and prospers. Vaikuntham, the family’s rice mill manager takes the gullible Ramanaiah into bad company which leads Anasuya to repent for her deeds. The story ends on a happy note with Sathyam and Suseela’s return to the joint family.
Cast & Crew: Adurthi had repaid Akkineni’s faith in him by giving him a super hit. Excellent support came from cinematographer P.S. Selvaraj, art director S. Krishnarao and dialogue writer Acharya Athreya. This association of Adurthi with Annapurna Pictures and ANR continued for many years creating some of the greatest hits in Telugu cinema. ANR and Adurthi later partnered to make two critically acclaimed off beat movies – Sudigundaalu and Maroprapancham .
With an ensemble of experienced actors in its cast, it is not easy to judge who has done better than whom. But two fine actors of South Indian cinema – Kannamba and Savitri stand out with their natural flair for getting into the skin of the character they are portraying. You watch Annapurna and Suseela on the screen and not the actors. In a women-centric theme, it is not easy to grab attention, but ANR (as Sathyam) and SVR (Kutumbarao) effectively created their own space and left a mark. Suryakantham (Anasuya), Relangi (Ramanaiah) and Jaggaiah (Vaikuntham) impresses. The other key players were — Rajasulochana as the oomph girl Navaneetham, Chadalavada Kutumbarao (money lender Tirupathaiah), Allu Ramalingaiah (rice mill clerk), Maganti Bapineedu (Suryam, Kutumbarao’s eldest son) and Parvathi (Kutumbarao’s daughter. She later became a popular dubbing artiste), Master Kundu (Anasuya’s son Vasu) and Master Sarath Babu (Suseela’s son). E.V. Saroja and choreographer A.K. Chopra performed to the popular song – town pakkakelloddura dingari… (lyric: Kosaraju, singers: Ghantasala, Jikki). The dog Rude (Jimmy in the movie) trained by R. Janakirama Chowdhary of Madanapalle was a major attraction.
Master Venu mesmerised the audience with is melodious score. He was supported by sound engineer A. Krishnan and sound recordist K. Viswanath. One can find traces of influence of his guru Naushad’s music in Venu’s tunes. The super hit numbers include – Carulo shikaru kelle paala buggala pasididhana (Lyric: Athreya). Many confuse this song as Sri Sri’s work. But Athreya wrote it much earlier after watching college going girls on a car ride in Marina beach. Ghantasala’s melodious rendition made it an all time hit along with Naluguru kalisi porupulu mariachi cheyyali ummadi vyavasayam… (Sri Sri) and the duet Aaduthu paaduthu panichesthunte… (Kosaraju, Ghantasala-Susheela). The filming of this song is a classic example of Adurthi’s craftsmanship. During the entire song, ANR and Savitri were shown feeding the water from the canal to the channel in the fields. No trace of slackness as the audience enjoyed the lyric, the rendition, the ambience and the beautiful and expressive faces of Savitri and ANR. It was shot at Janapasatram, near Gudur in the fields of T. Srinivasulu Naidu. P. Susheela became a sought after singer for every heroine after this movie.
Trivia: Boddapati Krishnarao who played the advocate’s clerk Sankaraiah, hailed from a village near Machilipatnam and was a teacher for NTR’s wife Basava Rama Tarakam. NTR helped him get minor roles in his movies and also appointed him as a tuition teacher for his children.
Todikodallu was the first film script in Telugu to be brought out as a novel. Penned by Ramchand, it was published by Dukkipati.
Nishkriti was made in Bengali twice — in 1953 (by Pashupathi Chattopadhyay) and in 1978 by director Sunil Basu Mullick with Anup Kumar and Madhabi Mukherjee in the lead. Basu Chatterjee directed the Hindi version, Apna Paraye (1980) starring Amol Palekar and Shabana Azmi.
Since ANR, Savitri, S.V.R and Kannamba were popular with the Tamil audience too, Todikodallu was simultaneously made by Annapurna Pictures in Tamil as Enga Veettu Mahalakshmi (released on Feb 1, 1957). Thangavelu reprised Relangi, Sundaribai (Suryakantham) and Nambiar (Jaggaiah). C.V. Sridhar wrote the dialogue. Adurthi helmed this project too. It was a big hit.
Released on January 11, 1957, Todikodallu celebrated hundred days in five centres and the felicitations were held between April 20-24 at Tenali, Guntur, Vizag and Vizianagaram. Todikodallu received the certificate of merit at the National awards.
