“It takes years to build reputation, but minutes to lose it” – this is one of the famous quotes of Warren Buffet’s on reputation. It applies not only to the businesses but also to various other scenarios like character of a person, image of a hero, goodwill of a brand etc. NTR, in a recent interview during Jai Lava Kusa promotions told the media that he too did some mistakes in early days of his career. He told he could not handle stupendous success he got with Simhadri at such early age and so committed mistakes. He also previously mentioned that it took almost one “Pushkaram” (12 years) to get back to track. It is known that from Simhadri to Temper, he had faced somewhat slump period though there are occasional hits like Yamadonga. After seeing such a deep introspection from Tarak, everyone felt that he has matured a lot and he is just a few feet far from the top position in Tollywood. But all the euphoria seems to have suddenly vanished with just one statement from none other than NTR himself. Though there was good response to NTR’s somewhat harsh statements on critics, now almost everyone coming to the conclusion that NTR shouldn’t have spoken that.

Last 2 years have been very special to NTR. He got a genuine hit after so many years in the form of Temper movie. Immediately followed is Nannaku Prematho movie, with which NTR first time conquered the overseas market in which he was till then termed a weak player. Also with this movie, NTR proved his mettle in urban markets too. Then came Janatha Garage, the hat trick movie, which simultaneously received critical applause as well as thunderous response from masses. Then, with Bigg boss show, he created sort of history. The show became humongous hit and NTR for the first time in decade plus year old career, won the huge following in women audience and families. What Bigg boss achieved couldn’t have been achieved by 10 Brindavanam. When everything seem to be going fine, came this, one silly comment on critics and analysts that spoiled the mood all of a sudden.

Let’s see why NTR’s scathing comments on critics are wrong –

1. While NTR is acting for his earning, directors are making movies for their earning, so are these critics and analysts. They are just performing their duties. As all movies are not good (film industry has just 2% success rate, to quote late Dr. D. Rama Naidu), critics HAVE to criticize those movies that are not good, and that is their duty. They will say movie is bad if it is bad. There is no need for a star like NTR to blast these poor creatures.

2. Ok fine, I understand that there are instances when these reviewers utterly failed to predict movie results. But what does that mean?. it means, even though the critics have given low ratings, audience ignored it and accepted the movie, which proves if movie has the content, no critic can spoil the prospects of the movie.

3. Well, NTR’s point might be that there are some people who are intentionally mud slinging on the movie in social media or web media in the name of criticism. Ok, but does he also not agree that there other fans who also positively overrate the movie in the same social media. If a star is perfectly fine with fans shouldering the movie and positively overrate it, he should also be ready to face some uncomfortable comments in the same social media from others who are not his fans. After all, everybody need not be a hard-core fan of NTR.

NTR is not the first to do so, but…

NTR is not the first one to attack reviewers. Director Deva katta was the first one to do so in 2005 (in Tollywood) , the time when impact of web reviews was not even felt by industry. He attacked popular website of that time (idle brain) and popular Telugu daily (eenadu) for poor reviews on his debut movie Vennela. Followed him was Krishna Vamsi in 2006 for his movie Danger. After that several film makers did the same but among star heroes, Allu Arjun was the first one to do so for his DJ movie. Bunny got similar ratings for Sarainodu movie but it went on to become hit among masses. So he was so confident that his DJ movie also despite bad ratings will fetch good revenues and he vent-through his dissatisfaction. But those comments from Bunny did even more harm to DJ movie. To make the things worse, director Harish Shankar joined his hero in attacking the critics by posting the collections of the movie. But the web media and netizens also took the challenge and proved that those collections were fake. Overall, DJ team not only lost collections but also respect. Seems NTR didn’t learn anything from the mistake of DJ team. NTR in fact got rave reviews for his performance in Jai Lava Kusa though story line is weak. Most of the reviewers lauded NTR for pulling up such a weak story from his shoulders. Despite all this, what these analysts got from NTR is a remark that “you are road side guys (daari na poye daanayya)”. Shouldn’t this impact their morale?

Also to be noted here that various web sites and social media channels some time back conducted surveys with different titles like – “who will be next number one hero”, “who will be next Chiranjeevi?”, “will NTR be next number one”. Most of the surveys came with results showing NTR is really main contender for this position, though there have been variations in the results from various channels. With back to back hits and Bigg boss show NTR appeared to be on top form. Being in this kind of top form, does a star with such stature have to take so seriously what a particular section of web media or social media saying. Doesn’t it show some sort of inferiority complex from his side.

No celebrity has ever won the battle with media – be it mainstream media, web media or social media. As the saying goes, “film industry is like a glass house. Whether stone is thrown on it from outside or inside, it is the house that will be broken”. NTR should be already knowing this. NTR should focus more on the content of his movies and deliver good content. By doing so, he is automatically forcing all the analysts and critics to give good feedback as those giving incorrect analysis will perish from business anyway. But he can’t force the same analysts to give good ratings with this kind of scathing remarks. Sooner he understands this, better for his own career!!!