Shaakuntalam: Samantha's EPIC Fantasy Love Story By Gunasekhar Turns Out The Biggest Disaster! Details Inside

Photo Credit:

Samantha Ruth Prabhu's latest film Shaakuntalam, directed by veteran Gunasekhar, earned a whole lot of negative reviews upon its theatrical release. The movie is Samantha's pan-India venture made on a whopping Rs 50 Crore.

Shaakuntalam is the epic love story of Shakuntala and Dushyanta, a tale that was depicted in Mahabharatha. The story was written by Kalidasa and was now adapted for celluloid by a larger-than-life film director.

The makers of the film have organized a preview show for the fans to spread word-of-mouth about Shaakuntalam, which they thought might help in heavy openings. Contrary to their beliefs, Shaakuntalam was reviewed as a below-par film in terms of visual effects, story narration, and performance. Several pointed out Samantha as unfit for the role of Shakuntala. After the preview reports came in, Samantha too refrained from promoting the film like earlier.

While the film's teaser, trailer, dialogue trailer, and again release trailer was released, nothing could make an impact on the people, fans, and regular movie-goers. The reason that Shaakuntalam is also an age-old story with no conflict there was nothing to look forward to.

Allu Arjun's daughter Allu Arha made her acting debut in the role of Prince Bharatha, which impressed the viewers big time. Whatever good was about Shaakuntalam, it was credited to Arha.

In addition to these, Samantha's interviews speaking about her struggles rather than the Shaakuntalam movie also had an impact. Although the promotions were carried out on a large scale, with elaborate 3D sets being erected at the sets, there were zero buzzes for the movie which was Samantha's high-budget film to date, on a female-centric story.

While the movie was approximately made on about Rs 60 Crore including the promotional campaigns, etc, the first three days' share couldn't even cross Rs 10 Crore. The digital streaming rights were also sold for a not-so-great price to Amazon Prime Video. Given the figures, trade experts and the Tollywood fraternity determined Shaakuntalam as a total disaster.