The Paradise (Telugu with English Subtitles)

The Paradise at Victory Cinema The Paradise is the second film from Nani and writer-director Srikanth Odela, whose first collaboration, Dasara, became one of the defining Telugu hits of 2023. It opens at Victory Cinema on Thursday, 24 September 2026, in Telugu with English subtitles, and it arrives as a very different proposition from the usual star vehicle: an A-certified period drama, two hours and forty-nine minutes long, built around a marginalised community in the slums of 1980s Secunderabad and the leader who rises from it. The story of Jadal Nani plays Jadal, a man from a tribal community that has been denied its basic rights for generations. The film follows his rise from the margins into a leader who takes on a system of oppression that has settled so deeply into the city that nobody questions it any more. Odela has described the film as being about a mother and son, and about a people who once fought for their country only to find they had no place in it, and who then decide to fight back. That gives the story two engines running together: an intimate one, in Jadal's relationship with his mother, played by Sonali Kulkarni, and a public one, in the confrontation between his people and the powers arrayed against them. Those powers have faces. Raghav Juyal, who made his mark as the unsettling antagonist of Kill, plays Vikram Malik, Jadal's principal opponent. Mohan Babu plays Shikanja Malik, the older embodiment of the established order. Kayadu Lohar plays the female lead, and Sampoornesh Babu appears in a pivotal role. The casting alone signals that Odela is not making a conventional hero-versus-villain film; the antagonists are given weight, and the community around Jadal is populated rather than sketched. Nani in a new register Nani has called The Paradise the most tiring film of his career, physically and mentally, and the first-look and song materials show why: this is a raw, blood-marked, physically transformed performance, far from the affable everyman roles that built his following. He has also been careful to set expectations honestly, saying the film has no underwater sequence and no thousand-man fight, only action blocks that carry emotion inside the violence. After Dasara, where Odela drew a coarse, wounded performance from him, that promise is the point. This is a star willing to be unlikeable in service of a character. A period world built by hand The 1980s Secunderabad of the film is a constructed world, not a backdrop. Avinash Kolla's production design, Ch Sai's cinematography and Navin Nooli's editing shape a city of tight lanes, tin roofs and political heat, and the film's palette, dust and blood and lamplight, has been visible in everything the makers have released. Anirudh Ravichander, working with Odela for the first time, composes the score and songs, including Aaya Sher, sung by Jangi Reddy with lyrics by Kasarla Shyam, which has already had a large life online. The dialogue is written by Thota Srinivas and Ajju Mahakali. Sudhakar Cherukuri produces under the SLV Cinemas banner, with Ishan Saksena as co-producer. No trailer, by choice The Paradise is releasing without a conventional theatrical trailer. The makers said plainly that cutting one to the standard they wanted would have cost Odela and Anirudh four or five days they preferred to spend finishing the film. For audiences, that means walking in knowing the premise, the people and the mood, and very little else. It is an unusual way to release a film of this scale, and it suits a story whose force is meant to build rather than be given away. Anirudh and Nani, third time as composer Anirudh Ravichander and Nani have worked together before, and the songs outlived the films' runs. In 2019 Anirudh scored Jersey, whose Adhento Gaani Vunnapaatuga became one of the most replayed Telugu songs of that year, and in the same year he composed for Nani's Gang Leader. Last year he was back in Nani's orbit as the voice of Thanu in HIT: The Third Case, the song that carried that film's rage. The Paradise is their first full collaboration on this scale, and the first time Anirudh has worked with Srikanth Odela, who used Santhosh Narayanan on Dasara. The early evidence, from the score under the character glimpses to Aaya Sher, is of a composer treating the film as a rebellion set to music rather than a hero's soundtrack. On a Dolby Atmos system that difference is audible. Vikram Maalik Raghav Juyal comes to The Paradise off Kill, where his performance as the film's chief antagonist turned a dancer and television presenter into one of the most talked-about screen villains of 2024. Here he plays Vikram Maalik, the man hunting Jadal. The character glimpse released in June introduced him as a stylish, menacing figure of real power, gold chains and an unhurried walk, the kind of villain whose danger comes from certainty rather than volume. He shares the antagonist's side of the story with Mohan Babu's Shikanja Maalik, the older order that Vikram enforces, which gives Jadal not one opponent but a whole structure to bring down. In Odela's words Srikanth Odela has been unusually plain about what he set out to make. He has called The Paradise a revolutionary, emotional film about a mother and son and about a marginalised community, and summarised the story as one of a people who fought for their country and then, finding they had no place in it, chose to fight back. He has said the film's central idea is that you do not need an identity to be a leader; that this time he is not blurring or masking societal taboos; and that he is committed to presenting the film in its rawest form. Nani, for his part, has described it as India's Mad Max, wild in tone but with poetic justice, and called it the most tiring film of his career, physically and mentally. Odela's stated ambition is a global audience for the film, which is part of why The Paradise plays at Victory Cinema with English subtitles. Why see it at Victory Cinema A film like this asks for a large screen, a sophisticated room and an audience. Victory Cinema is Bengaluru's favourite hall of 505 seats, every one of them at the same price, with 4K Barco laser projection and Dolby Atmos sound. A period drama shot for scale and a score written for the room are exactly what that setup exists for, and a first-week crowd for a Nani film is its own experience. We present The Paradise in Telugu with English subtitles, so it is open to everyone in Bengaluru, not only Telugu speakers. Booking is direct at victorycinema.in, with no booking fee of any kind. You choose your exact seat on the map, pay by UPI, card or netbanking, and receive your ticket on WhatsApp and SMS, with a PDF copy in your account. The film is A-certified, so it is for adults only, and at two hours forty-nine minutes it is worth checking the showtime against your evening before you book.

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