Ragada

Ragada
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Veeru Potla
Written by	Veeru Potla
Produced by	D. Siva Prasad Reddy
Starring	Nagarjuna Akkineni Anushka Shetty Priyamani Dev Gill
Cinematography	Sarvesh Murari
Edited by	Marthand K. Venkatesh
Music by	S. Thaman
Production company	Kamakshi Movies
Release date	24 December 2010 (2010-12-24)
Running time	136 min
Country	India
Language	Telugu

Ragada (transl. Friction) is a 2010 Indian Telugu-language action comedy film directed by Veeru Potla and produced by D. Siva Prasad Reddy. It stars Nagarjuna, Anushka Shetty, Priyamani and Dev Gill in lead roles, with the music composed by S. Thaman.^[1][2] In the film, Satya leaves his village and arrives in Andhra Pradesh to earn money and willingly participates in a fight between two rivals that brings him to their attention.

Ragada was released theatrically on 24 December 2010. In 2011, it was dubbed and released into Tamil as Vambu.^[3] The same year, it was dubbed in Hindi under the same name.

Devudu attempts to kill an innocent man, who is against Peddanna, but is killed by one of Peddanna's followers Jairam. Peddanna is the famed gangster in Andhra Pradesh, and has three major followers who murder people for him. These followers are Jairam, Bhagavan and Nanda.

Meanwhile, Satya Reddy is a money-minded man who gets involved in a fight between GK and Peddanna. Satya helps GK, who makes him as his partner, where GK's love interest Sirisha falls in love with Satya. Satya sees Ashtalakshmi being chased by goons where he saves her. Ashtalakshmi and her Brahmin family starts living with Satya for a few days. Satya makes up a plan for GK to fight Peddanna. In one fight, Jairam captures Sirisha, and Satya saves her by killing Jairam. Ashtalakshmi also loves Satya. Sirisha meets a tattooed friend in the pub which Satya notices. In a restaurant during lunch with Sirisha and Ashtalakshmi, Satya is attacked by Bhagavan's henchmen. Satya goes to Bhagavan's house and kills him and his father, which enrages Peddanna.

Past: Satya was an orphan who is taken care by a doctor. The people of the city Kadapa worship her like a goddess. Devendra, a political campaigner and Peddanna's brother, kidnap the doctor's daughter to make sure that she tells everyone to vote for him, but to no avail. Satya arrives and thrashes up Devendra's men, where he learns that he has to acquire ₹72 crore (US$8.6 million) to keep the doctor's hospital running as Devendra's father had donated the land to the hospital. Peddanna kills the doctor with the help of his goons as Satya has thrashed his brother. In order to get the money and exact vengeance against the goons who killed the doctor, Satya had joined GK.

Present: At this time, Satya is back in his house and is dealing with Ashtalakshmi's parents, who are weeping uncontrollably. He finds out that Peddanna's men long ago kidnapped Ashtalakshmi's elder brother. Satya goes to the headquarters where her brother is held and frees him. Satya later finds out that Ashtalakshmi had robbed ₹180 crore (US$22 million) from Peddanna with the help of her brother, where she and her brother leave to Bangkok. Satya and Sirisha arrive at Bangkok, where it is revealed that Ashtalakshmi doesn't have money. Sirisha and Ashtalakshmi are friends and Ashtalakshmi is the same tattooed girl from the pub.

Satya reveals that he knew about their plan from the beginning and that he was the one who stolen the money. Satya is here to kill Nanda as he knew that Ashtalakshmi's brother will follow Nanda to get his money's share. Satya kills Nanda and returns to India. GK listening to one of his henchmen's words, escapes to Dubai so Satya won't kill him.

Peddanna kidnaps Satya's younger sister and tries to bury her, but Satya arrives with Peddhanna's brother. Satya then kills Peddhanna's men and his enforcer. He finally exacts his vengeance for his mother by killing off Peddhanna, and saving the hospital. Devendra, Peddhanna's brother runs away presumably being spared.

The soundtrack was composed by S. Thaman and released by Aditya Music. The audio was launched on 29 November 2010 at the Shilpa Kala Vedika in Hyderabad.^[4]

Ragada received generally mixed reviews from critics.

Andhra Box Office gave the film 3.25 stars out of 5 and called it a treat for Nagarjuna's fans, while praising the action sequences, comedy, songs, punch dialogues and the direction but criticizing Nagarjuna's dance and the predictable storyline.^[5]123Telugu similarly gave the film 3.25 stars out of 5 and praised Nagarjuna's performance, Brahmanandam's comedy, the technical aspects and the presence of multiple villains while criticizing the second half and the climax.^[6] Idlebrain.com gave it 3 stars out of 5, similarly praising Nagarjuna's performance and Anushka's acting without the makeup along with the twists in the second half, the action sequences and the technical aspects, while criticizing the lack of story in the first half and the presence of multiple villains.^[7] Greatandhra also gave it 3 stars out of 5 and praised Nagarjuna's performance, glamour quotient, the opening fight sequence and presentation of songs, but criticized the second half, the placement of songs, jerks in the editing and lack of depth in the characterization of villains.^[8]

On the other hand, Rediff.com gave it 2.5 stars out of 5 and praised Nagarjuna's performance and called the film worth the money while also labelling it formulaic.^[9] Fullhyd gave it 1.5 stars out of 5, praising Brahmanandam's comedy while criticizing the violence and placement of songs.^[10]

Ragada collected ₹8.48 crores in the opening week.^[11] In the second week, the collections amounted to ₹11.54 crores.^[12] The total collections in the fourth week amounted to ₹15.27 crores and the total collections including the overseas gross were equal to ₹17.15 crores.^[13][14]

• Ragada at IMDb