The South Indian Telugu film industry based in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, also known by its widespread nickname "Tollywood", released some excellent and popular Telugu movies in 2017. While many of them performed well at the box office, others brought in rather disappointing numbers. Nevertheless, every title in the top 10 list has something in common: P2P file sharers love to watch these new movies!
Though demand in theaters may vary because of other movies competing for audiences' attention, P2P data offers unbiased real-time data on the demand for films in worldwide target markets, regardless of whether or not they’re officially available.
Read on to discover 2017’s best and most popular Telugu movies among P2P users worldwide, and to find out how they matched up in the latest rankings!
POPULAR TELUGU MOVIES ESCAPE BOLLYWOOD’S SHADOW, STEP INTO THE LIMELIGHT OF TOP INDIAN MOVIES WORLDWIDE
No. 1 – ‘BAAHUBALI 2: THE CONCLUSION’ Unsurprisingly, the most remarkable and new popular Telugu movie in 2017 was S.S. Rajamouli’s bilingual fantasy-action film “Baahubali 2: The Conclusion”. Distributed in the South Indian languages Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam and Hindi, this juggernaut of a blockbuster rocked box office figures in India like no Indian movie before it. Having collected almost 1,500 crore (a crore denotes ten million, and in this case measures rupees; 1 crore of rupees currently equals about 150,000 USD) in Indian theaters, this movie that starred Prabhas earned its title of "the highest grossing movie at the Indian box office of all time."
The Indian Express reported on its success on December 28, 2017: “Indian cinema can be divided into two eras – pre-Baahubali and post-Baahubali. ‘Baahubali 2: The Conclusion’ not only created a storm at the box office, but also changed the way we look at our own films.”
On top of that, this popular Telugu movie’s success shows up not only in box office figures, but also in P2P networks all over India and in overseas markets! Altogether, “Baahubali 2: The Conclusion” drew a whopping 9.37 million file sharers to download and share the popular Telugu movie, earning it the top spot in 2017’s Telugu movie charts. Compared with 2017’s most pirated Bollywood movie, “Raees”, S.S. Rajamouli's action-drama attracted around one third more file sharers!
And there’s even more great news: The franchise has not yet reached its end! Director S.S. Rajamouli tweeted a confirmation of the rumors surrounding the production of the franchise’s new third part: “Looks Like I created more confusion instead of giving clarity..apologies.. Baahubali-3 is on cards... But the story that's written for the Two parts will not be dragged for the sake of it. This story will conclude with the second part itself. Baahubali-3 will be done in a way that audience have never experienced films before. Hope that clarifies..”
No. 2 – ‘DJ: DUVVADA JAGANNADHAM’ “Duvvada Jagannadham” – or simply abbreviated as “DJ” – is a 2017 Telugu-language action-comedy movie starring the popular Telugu movie stars Allu Arjun and Pooja Hegde. Released on more than 1000 screens across the cinemas of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, as well as more than 300 screens overseas, “DJ” performed well at the box office, collecting over 100 crore. Since the release of “DJ” at the end of June, it was downloaded and shared by almost 1.7 million fans worldwide, further underscoring its popularity. As a result, it claimed spot 2 on 2017’s chart of the most popular Telugu movies.
No. 3 – ‘ARJUN REDDY’ Spot 3 was seized by another high-grossing and popular Telugu action-drama, “Arjun Reddy”, which hit Indian theaters on August 25, 2017. Despite the relatively short period of time, almost 1.4 million P2P users pushed the film into 2017’s top 10 Telugu movie chart!
No. 4 – ‘FIDAA’ Written and directed by the popular Telugu movie director, screenwriter and producer Sekhar Kammula, the romance-drama film “Fidaa” hit Indian screens on July 21, 2017. One day following its release in theaters, P2P networks also saw some releases: Three torrent files containing the new movie appeared, driving the number of P2P users to nearly 100,000 on July 23. In total, 1.15 million fans pushed the romance movie into spot 4, mainly coming from India, the United Arab Emirates and Sri Lanka.
No. 5 – ‘KHAIDI NO. 150’ V. V. Vinayak’s remake of the Tamil blockbuster “Kaththi”, called “Khaidi No. 150”, was officially released on January 11, 2017. Produced with a budget of around 60 crore, “Khaidi No. 150” pulled in a massive box office revenue of nearly 47 crore on its first day in theaters. Looking at the demand from file sharers, nearly one million P2P users propelled the movie into spot 5 of the most downloaded and shared Telugu movies over file sharing networks in 2017.
SPOTS 6-10 IN THE LIST OF POPULAR TELUGU MOVIES COMPETE HEAD-TO-HEAD
No. 6 – ‘NINNU KORI’ Since July 7, when “Ninnu Kori” was released in theaters, 899,978 P2P users downloaded and shared the romance movie starring Indian film actor and producer Nani. As a result, “Ninnu Kori” earned spot 6 among the top 10 most popular Telugu movies.
No. 7 – ‘NENU LOCAL’ Next up, “Nenu Local”, starring the actors Nani, Naveen Chandra and Raghu Babu, grabbed hold of a coveted spot among 2017’s most popular Telugu movies. With around 30,000 fewer P2P users than “Ninnu Kori”, the romance-comedy film ended up in spot 7.
No. 8 – ‘LIE’ “Love Intelligence Enmity”, considered a big-ticket Telugu movie in 2017, was produced with a whopping budget of 50 crore. Yet at the box office the movie barely collected a disappointing 17 crore overall. Nevertheless, P2P user numbers revealed a fan base big enough to push the film into the list of the most popular Telugu movies: 841,974 fans downloaded and shared files of “LIE” since its release on August 11, 2017, earning it spot 8.
No. 9 – ‘NENE RAJU NENE MANTRI’ Written and directed by Teja, the Indian political thriller “Nene Raju Nene Mantri” hit screens on August 11, 2017. With only 10,000 fewer fans than “LIE”, “Nene Raju Nene Mantri” checked into spot 9 of 2017’s popular Telugu movie chart!
No. 10 – ‘RAJA THE GREAT’ Leaked on the same day as its official release, “Raja the Great” was highly demanded by P2P users worldwide. As a result of 774,121 file sharers downloading and sharing the popular Telugu movie worldwide, it landed in spot 10. Most fans watched the action blockbuster in India, followed by Sri Lanka and Saudi Arabia.
Source: TECXIPIO PIC
Definition: The rankings are based on the number of unique file sharers: How many peers (file sharers) shared at least one file of the respective top 10 Telugu movies in 2017?