Neelakanta

• Name — Neelakanta • Birth Name — G. Neelakanta Reddy • Birthplace — Kadapa, Andhra Pradesh, India • Education — Loyola College, Vijayawada • Occupation — Director, screenwriter, producer • Years Active — 1988present

Neelakanta is a native of Kadapa, Andhra Pradesh. He studied at Loyola Public School and Loyola College in Vijayawada. Since his school days, Neelakanta has had a deep love for film direction and film making which is what drove him to Chennai after his graduation.

Neelakanta worked as an assistant to Vallabhaneni Janardhan for Thodu Needa (1983) and Amayaka Chakravarthy (1983), both of which were remakes and flops. He made his debut as a producer for Jamadagni (1988) since he was a fan of Bharathiraja. He then worked on Priyanka (1994), the Tamil remake of Damini (1993). He then took a hiatus as all of the offers that he was receiving were for remakes and he wanted to make something original. He always wanted to make films which eloquently depicted the psychological study of characters for the off-beat his passion materialised with Show followed by Missamma. He received two national awards, one for Best Screenplay and the other for the Best Feature Film in Telugu for Show while state Nandi Award in the screenplay department for the latter. He then made Sada Mee Sevalo, with Shriya Saran and Venu Thottempudi in lead roles, and later made a psychological thriller, Nandanavanam 120km. Both these films did not do well at the box office. Despite its commercial failure, Nanadanavanam got him huge critical acclaim. These were followed by Mr.Medhavi. with Genelia and Raja in the lead roles. This film, produced by RamaRao Bodduluri, proved to be an above-average grosser. He also wrote dialogues for a Telugu remake of the Hindi hit A Wednesday!, entitled Eeenadu. In 2011, Neelakanta directed Virodhi, featuring Meka Srikanth and Kamalinee Mukherjee. Neelakanta secured the best dialogue writer award in the year 2011 for this film. In 2013 he directed Chammak Challo, which gathered bad reviews for both the director and the film. In 2018, he directed the Malayalam film Zam Zam starring Manjima Mohan. The film is an official remake of the Hindi film Queen.

• Note: All films are in Telugu, unless otherwise noted. • Year — Film — Director — Writer — Producer — Language — Notes • 1988 — Jamadagni — Telugu • 1994 — Priyanka — Screenplay — Tamil • 2002 — Show — Telugu — Winner - two National Film Awards • 2003 — Missamma — Winner - Nandi Award for Best Screenplay Writer • 2005 — Sadaa Mee Sevalo • 2006 — Nandanavanam 120km • 2008 — Mr. Medhavi • 2009 — Eenadu — Dialogues • 2011 — Virodhi — Screened at International Film Festival of India – 2011 Winner - Two Nandi Awards 2011 Screened at Melbourne International Film Festival-2011 • 2013 — Chammak Challo • 2014 — Maaya • 2023 — Circle • Zam Zam — Malayalam