Tata Birla Madhyalo Laila

Tata Birla Madhyalo Laila (transl. Tata and Birla with Laila in the middle) is a 2006 Indian Telugu-language film produced by Bekkam Venugopal, in his film debut and directed by Srinivasa Reddy. The film stars Sivaji, Krishna Bhagavan, and Laya in lead roles. The film is a remake of the 1996 Tamil movie Tata Birla and was a commercial success at the box office.

Tata Birla Madhyalo Laila
DVD cover
Directed by	Srinivasa Reddy
Produced by	Bekkam Venugopal
Starring	Sivaji Krishna Bhagavaan Tanikella Bharani Laya
Cinematography	Santosh Srinivas
Edited by	V. Nagireddy
Music by	M. M. Srilekha
Production company	Lucky Media
Release date	13 October 2006 (2006-10-13)
Running time	140 minutes
Country	India
Language	Telugu
Box office	₹3.8 crore distributors' share[1]

Plot

Tata (Sivaji) and Birla (Krishna Bhagavan) are 2 petty thieves who dream of planning a big robbery one day. Their dreams come true when they overhear a deal involving hundreds of crores. They lock up the original man who's hired for the deal and head to the home of Mahalakshmi (Laya), a wealthy heiress. They gradually realize the happiness of life and decide to quit being thieves. But it is then revealed that the deal was to kill Mahalakshmi and that the man responsible for the deal was Mahalakshmi's uncle Gajapathi (Tanikella Bharani). Soon Mahalakshmi even falls in love with Tata and he too falls for her eventually. Meanwhile, another mysterious man disguised as a lady (Ali) enters their household to kill Mahalakshmi as well. The rest of the story depicts on how Tata and Birla save Mahalakshmi from Gajapathi's plans and who the strange man really is.

Cast

Source^[2]

• Sivaji as Tata
• Krishna Bhagavaan as Birla
• Ali as Masthan alias Laila
• Laya as Mahalakshmi
• Tanikella Bharani as Gajapathi
• Raghu Babu as Dora Babu aka Thief Adhova Swamiji
• Duvvasi Mohan as Potti Lingam
• Gangadhar Panday as Businessman
• Brahmanandam as Police officer
• Padmanabham as Padmanabham
• Jeeva as Ratnam
• Hema as Orphanage caretaker
• Allari Subhashini as House Owner
• Rajitha as Mahalakshmi's aunt
• Chitram Srinu as Fox
• Master Bharath as Seetayya
• Gundu Hanumantha Rao as Seetayya's father
• Ashok Kumar as Robbery victim
• Kadambari Kiran as a Christian
• Apoorva as Police officer's wife

Soundtrack

Soundtrack was composed by M. M. Srilekha.^[3]

• "Nee Body Bamper" - Jassie Gift
• "Poovai Pova Cheliya" - Vijay Yesudas
• "Sithakoka Chilakalla" - Ganga
• "Dabbu..Dabbu.." - Muralidharan
• "Tirumalavaas" - Srileka
• "Akundi Vakkesi" - Tippu, Kalpana Raghavendar

Reception

A critic from Idlebrain.com wrote that "Overall, this movie can be summed as a musical comedy entertainer and lives to its tagline 'Saradaga navvukundam randi' (transl. Come let's have fun!)".^[2] A critic from Full Hyderabad wrote "The comedy in TBML is more situational and contextual rather than plot-driven – it is more like a book of jokes by a cartoonist rather than a Wodehouse novel. The dialogues range from witty to hilarious, the performances from deadpan to hyper-active, and your expressions from self-conscious happiness to thigh-slapping rollicking. And at the end of it all, you won’t ask yourself any stupid questions".^[4] A critic from Indiaglitz wrote that " The film has good entertainment values and the theatres would attract more audiences after mouth publicity about the comedy and entertainment values in the film".^[5] Telugu Cinema wrote "Tata Birla Madhyalo Laila is primarily a comedy film and thankfully the focus is more on comedy than the heroism. Despite its formulaic story and below average technical values, the film entertains because of its fine comic scenes".^[6]

See also

• Tata-Birla word pair