Currently, South films dominate the box office, but this wasn’t always the scenario. Bollywood held the position of the leading film industry in India for years, making it challenging for films from the four southern industries to contend with Hindi films. Yash, the star of KGF mentioned in a recent interview that for a long time movies from the southern regions were poorly represented in the north, almost treated as a joke. This perception underwent a transformation after the success of Baahubali.

“10 years ago, dubbed films became very popular here (North India). But, initially they all started watching with different opinions. People used to make fun of South films. They were like ‘yeh kya action hai, udd raha hai sab’ (what is this action, everything is flying). That’s how it started and eventually they got hooked on to that and they started understanding that art form. The problem with that was our films were sold for a bare minimum price, people used to do bad quality dubbing and it used to be presented in a bad way with funny names,” said Yash to India Conclave Today.

Yash Credits SS Rajamouli for Shifting Perception

Over the years, viewers became more receptive to films from the south, thanks to their growing familiarity with this genre of cinema. Yash attributed this shift to SS Rajamouli, acknowledging,

“People started becoming familiar with our dubbed films. It was long pending. Credit goes to SS Rajamouli sir. If you have to break a rock, continuous effort is needed. Baahubali gave that push. KGF was done with a different intention. What KGF was that it was not done to intimidate, but to inspire. People have now started noticing South films.”

He emphasized that Baahubali played a crucial role in pushing this recognition forward. Regarding KGF, Yash clarified that it was not intended to intimidate but rather to inspire, and he noted that people have now started taking notice of South films.