''Gaja'' is a 2008 Indian

Kannada-language Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native sp ...

action romance film directed by K. Madesh. The film stars Darshan and

Devaraj Devaraj (born 20 September 1953) is an Indian actor and theatre actor who works in Indian film industry. He has largely featured in Kannada films performing various roles as a lead character, supporting character and villainous character. He ha ...

. Producers of the film claimed that the film is based on a story by novelist P. Ramachandra Rao (Chandu). The film is a remake of the 2005

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India *Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language ** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode S ...

film ''

Bhadra ''Bhadra''Feminine: sa, भद्रा, Bhadrā is a Sanskrit word meaning 'good', 'fortune' or 'auspicious'. It is also the name of many men, women and objects in Hindu mythology. Male Figures King of Chedi Bhadra was a king of Chedi Kingdom ...

''. The movie was also dubbed into

Hindi Hindi (Devanāgarī: or , ), or more precisely Modern Standard Hindi (Devanagari: ), is an Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in the Hindi Belt region encompassing parts of northern, central, eastern, and western India. Hindi has been de ...

as ''Gajja Thakur''.

Plot

Gaja ( Darshan) and Krishna are friends. Gaja goes out to Krishna's village for a holiday but finds some startling events happening. He finds that Krishna's brother Devendra has a running feud with a rival faction, which prevents a harmonious relationship between the two families. But Gaja becomes a darling of Devendra's family and he also takes a liking to Shwetha (

Navya Nair Navya Nair is an Indian actress who has appeared predominantly in Malayalam films, along with others in Kannada and Tamil. She is the recipient of several awards. Personal life Nair married Santhosh Menon in 2010, and the couple have a son. ...

), the sister of Devendra. But in a faction fight later Devendra is killed along with his wife. Gaja tries to save the situation, but when he finds that the entire family of Devendra has become a target, he wants to run away with his friend Krishna and Shwetha. The rival faction leader's brother will kill Krishna and in a retaliatory mood Gaja kills him. He then escapes to Bangalore along with Shwetha. And then a cat and mouse game starts with Gaja being hounded by the rival faction leaders. Finally Gaja wins the battle.

Cast

* Darshan as Gaja alias Gajendra Moorthi *

as Shwetha *

as Devendra, Shwetha's eldest brother * Sourav as Krishna, Shwetha's brother * Pradeep Rawat *

Shobaraj Shobaraj is an Indian actor in the Kannada film industry. Some of his notable films include '' Yajamana'' (2000), ''Shabdavedhi'' (2000), '' Police Story'' (1996), and '' Sangliyana Part-3'' (1997). Career Shobaraj has been part of more than 2 ...

as Shivanna, Devendra's brother *Bhavya *Ashalatha *Deepa Iyer *Sangeetha *Nischitha Gowda as Gaja's cousin *

Thejaswini ''Thejaswini'' is a 1962 Indian Kannada-language film, directed by H. L. N. Simha and produced by Pandari Bai. The film stars Rajkumar, Pandari Bai, Rajashankar and Rajasree. The film had musical score by M. Venkataraju. The movie is based on ...

*Ravi Chetan * Komal as Gaja's friend *Ekta Khosla as Satya *

Chitra Shenoy Chitra Shenoy is an Indian actress and producer in South Indian movies and television series. She has acted in more than 600 films in Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu, Tulu, and Hindi. She is known as the 'young mother' in the Kannada film ind ...

* Master Hirannaiah as Gaja's grandfather *

Srinath Narayana Swamy (born 28 December 1944), known by his stage name Srinath, is an Indian actor and film producer who works predominantly in Kannada cinema. He holds the position of vice-president of the Kannada television channel Udaya TV. He is ...

as Gaja's father *

Subbaraju Penmetsa Subbaraju is an Indian actor who predominantly works in Telugu cinema,as well as Tamil cinema.Subbaraju has played a variety of roles, from negative to supporting characters. His most notable works include '' Amma Nanna O' Tamil Ammay ...

* Sathyajith *Ravi Varma *Chinnayya *Tharakesh Patel *Aruna Balaraj *Jaidev * Bhanu Prakash *Rakhi Savanth *Stunt Siddu *Lamboo Nagesh *Hulivana Gangadharayya *Malathi Sardeshpande *Shobha Raghavendra

Soundtrack

The soundtrack was composed by

V. Harikrishna V. Harikrishna (born 5 November 1974) is an Indian film score and Soundtrack, soundtrack composer, playback singer and film producer. He has mainly scored music for Kannada cinema, Kannada films. After his stint as a programmer and assistant mu ...

. All lyrics were written by

V. Nagendra Prasad V. Nagendra Prasad is a lyricist, composer and director who predominantly works for Kannada Cinema. He has penned more than 3000 songs, particularly for Kannada cinema. Early life He was born on 3 December 1975. He is the elder son to Cou ...

Critical reception

Sify Sify Technologies Limited (formerly Satyam Infoway) is an Indian information and communications technology company providing end-to-end ICT solutions including telecom services, data center services, cloud & managed services, transformation in ...

'' gave the film a rating of 4/5 and praised the role of acting, music and the camera departments in the film. R G Vijayasarathy of

Rediff.com Rediff.com (stylized as ''rediff.com'') is an Indian news, information, entertainment and shopping web portal. It was founded in 1996. It is headquartered in Mumbai, with offices in Bangalore, New Delhi and New York City. , it had more than 300 e ...

scored the film at 2 out of 5 stars and says "Gaja's main strength is the music of Harikrishna and rich production values. Cameraman Ramesh Babu has to be complimented for his efforts. The songs Maathu Nannolu, Lambooji Lambooji, and Aithalakadi' are very well choreographed. And so are the fights. The only thumbs down to Gaja is the director and producer's claim that their film is an original."

Release

Gaja was released on 11 January 2008. It was certified as 'A' by the censor board. It completed over 100 days at the box office, and became a comeback film for Darshan after huge flops. "Bul Bul" and Gaja title song became chartbusters.

References

External links

* Films set in Bangalore 2000s Kannada-language films 2008 films Kannada remakes of Telugu films Films scored by V. Harikrishna {{2000s-Kannada-film-stub