C.PULLAIH,Photographer turned Producer

C. Pullaiah purchased a second hand movie camera in 1924 in Bombay
Kakinada with an intention to make films in Andhra soil. He
shot a thousand feet silent film, Markandeya, with himself cast as
Yama and made the film with so many indigenous methods and projected
the film on a white washed wall in his house to the amazement of his
friends through the very same camera with which he shot the film. He
used to call cinema as Goda Meedi Bomma. It was C. Pullaiah who gave
Telugu cinema's first super duper hit, Lavakusa (1934) starring
Parupalli Subbarao and Sriranjani (Sr.). It was his second feature
film (Savithri his first talkie film was made a year before with
Ramathilakam and Gaggaiah was a hit too. Interestingly there were two
Savithris and two Ramadasus in 1933). People flocked to the theatres
from near by villages in bullock carts to see Lavakusa. History
repeated when C. Pullaiah and his son C. S. Rao remade the film in
1963 with N. T. Rama Rao and Anjali Devi. At a time when the market
was flooded with mythological films, Indian Art Cine tone attempted a
social, Prema Vijayam (1936) directed by Krithiventi Nageswara Rao.
However, the success of reformist filmmaker Gudavalli Ramabrahmam's
Malapilla (1938) starring Dr. Govindarajula Subbarao and Kanchanamala
and Rythubidda (1939) with Ballari Raghava and Suryakumari gave an
impetus to Y.V. Rao, B.N. Reddy and others to produce films on social
themes.