New gen films score big at Filmfare

To call the 65th Jio

Filmfare Awards

South 2018 a night when the stars descended on earth would be a cliché. But there is probably no better way to describe an evening when gleaming stars of the four South Indian film industries gathered to celebrate cinema at its best at the Hyderabad International Convention Centre (HICC) on Saturday.

The big winner of the evening for Kannada cinema was Chowka, which took home three awards — Best Director — Tharun Sudhir, Best Playback Singer (Female) —Anuradha Bhat for Appa I Love You and Best Lyrics — Nagrendra Prasad for Appa I Love You. The awards for the song only seemed fitting, considering that they came on the eve of Father’s Day. This sentiment wasn’t lost on our stars either, especially Anuradha, who was accompanied by her father, who minced no words in expressing how proud he was of his daughter. An emotional Tharun dedicated the award to his father. He was accompanied by his mother onstage.

Given the hits last year, the fight for Best Film was a tough one, but it came as little surprise when director Raj B Shetty and producer Suhan Prasad took home the coveted Black Lady for their debut film,

Ondu Motteya Kathe

. The big winners of the evening were, of course, the Best Actor in a Leading Role (Male) and Best Actor in a Leading Role (Female) — Puneeth Rajkumar for Raajakumara and Sruthi Hariharan for Beautiful Manasagalu, respectively. This is the fifth time that Puneeth has claimed the Black Lady, while it is Sruthi’s second Filmfare Award.

While Dhananjaya secured the Critics’ Award for Best Actor (Male) for his performance as the poet-saint Allama in the film of the same name, Shraddha Srinath received the Critics’ Award for Best Actor (Female) for her ‘teacher’ act in Operation Alamelamma. Armaan Malik, who won more than just a few hearts for his rendition of Ondu Balebillu from Chakravarthy, was the Best Playback Singer (Male), while Bharath BJ took home the trophy for Best Music Director for Beautiful Manasugalu. P Ravi Shankar took home the Black Lady for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for College Kumar, while Bhavana Prakash did so for Urvi.

What’s a night that celebrates films without a healthy dose of glitz, glamour and a thumka or two? Namma Kannada hudugis set the right mood for the night, with Ashika Ranganath kicking things off in style, by grooving to numbers like Chuttu Chuttu from Raambo 2. Manvitha Harish soon followed by shaking a leg to songs from this year’s runaway hit, Tagaru.