Okkadu

Gunasekhar chose Charminar (pictured), a monument and mosque located in Hyderabad as the film's backdrop.

During his days as an assistant director in Madras (now Chennai), Gunasekhar dreamt of directing a film with the backdrop of Charminar, a monument and mosque located in Hyderabad. After watching West Side Story (1961), he took inspiration from the war between two gangs and wrote a script choosing Charminar and Old city area of Hyderabad as the film's backdrop.[3] Years later, Ashwini Dutt met Gunasekhar during the re-recording sessions of Choodalani Vundi (1998) where the latter saw the portfolio images of Mahesh Babu whose debut film Rajakumarudu was officially launched that day. Finding Mahesh Babu apt for the protagonist he envisioned, Gunasekhar narrated the script to him and gained his consent.[3]

After the release of Mrugaraju (2001), Gunasekhar resumed work on the film's script. After reading an interview of Pullela Gopichand who pursued a career in badminton against his father's wishes and faced many hardships, Gunasekhar made the protagonist a person who aspires to be a kabaddi player against his father's wishes.[3] He met Ramoji Rao who expressed his wish to produce the film and permitted Gunasekhar to erect a Charminar set at Ramoji Film City.[3]

Ramoji Rao walked out due to unknown reasons and Mahesh Babu, along with Gunasekhar, met M. S. Raju at Padmalaya Studios office. Mahesh Babu asked Raju to permit them to erect a Charminar set as they cannot avail police permission to shoot at the original after a person committed suicide by jumping from the top. Raju agreed to do so after listening to the script narration and the project was subsequently announced.[4]

Gunasekhar wanted to name the film as Athade Ame Sainyam, but the title was already registered for another film which made Gunasekhar name the film as Okkadu after considering Kabaddi.[4] The film was produced under the banner Sumanth Art Productions with a budget of ₹8–9 crore.[4]

Impressed with her screen presence in Yuvakudu (2000), Gunasekhar chose Bhumika Chawla as the film's female lead to be paired with Mahesh Babu.[4] Mukesh Rishi and Geetha were signed to play Mahesh Babu's parents in the film. The former called it a character close to his heart, calling it is a "soft role after a string of ferocious roles that I have played".[5] Prakash Raj was signed as the antagonist and was seen as a factionist who falls for Bhumika's character in the film.[6] Telangana Shakuntala played the role of Prakash Raj's mother in the film for which she had to smoke cigar. Chandra Mohan and Niharika were seen in supporting roles as Bhumika's father and Mahesh Babu's sister respectively.[7]

Paruchuri Brothers were signed to write the film's dialogues. Mani Sharma composed the score and Sekhar V. Joseph was its cinematographer.[4] A. Sreekar Prasad edited the film,[8] and Ashok Kumar was its art director.[9] Sreekar Prasad called it a difficult film as it went through many forms of narration and he found it challenging to keep the pace very fast to make it slick and engaging.[8] After the first copy was ready, Paruchuri Brothers suggested Gunasekhar to prefer a linear narrative to the non linear narrative being used. The latter, along with Sreekar Prasad, changed the non-linear narration to linear, within ten minutes.[4]

The film's unit erected the Charminar set in the ten acres of land owned by D. Ramanaidu at Gopannapalle near Hyderabad. The original height of Charminar is 176 feet (54 m) and the height of each minaret is 78 feet (24 m) feet. The film's unit decided to construct the set with a length of 120 feet (37 m) feet by not altering the minarets and instead reduce the total length of the remaining part. The surroundings of Charminar were recreated in five acres around the set. 300 workers were employed in the construction of the set which lasted for three months and costed ₹1.75 crore.[4]

The makers decided to create the roads near the set using computer graphics in order to reduce the budget. Principal photography began in the same set and fifteen generators were used for illuminating the area. Strada Cranes were used for filming key scenes after ordinary cranes proved to be futile.[4] The film's climax was shot in December 2002 for 11 days and 1000 junior artistes participated in the film's shoot amid extreme climatic conditions. Despite receiving training in Kabaddi, Mahesh Babu was injured several times during the film's shoot.[4]