Before I grew up and became a snob who scoffs at Telugu cinema and started writing smart-ass reviews making fun of them, I was a kid in love with the same cinema. And like any other kid, I loved my movies full of adventure and action. But sadly ( no disrespect to Chirus and Balayyas of tollywood), there are only few ways you can beat up a bunch of ugly goons before it gets repetitive and predictive.

But “English movies” (as we used to call them)?? That’s the real stuff. Giant animals fighting? Robots?? Car chases? Explosions?!!! Shut up and take my money!

Alas. As a middle class kid without cable TV, I didn’t have access to these movies. Even if I did, it wouldn’t have helped much since I was a Telugu medium kid who could barely understand the dialogue.

That’s why the Telugu dubbed Hollywood movies are a seminal part of my childhood. And I am sure, it’s the same for lot of you folks out there.

The rush of excitement when you see a poster in the street – the tantalizing name(రాకాసి మొసలి!!!!), the poster where the makers tried to cram as much action as possible in every inch, and a well meaning (but largely unnecessary) one liner informing us what the movie is about(కంటికి కనిపించని అదృశ్య హంతకుడు సృష్టించిన విధ్వంసం) – is incomparable. That would inevitably lead to excited discussion with friends about the movie. After successfully coaxing parents to shell out money, we were there – usually on a Sunday afternoon – a semi-shady theatre in the town where the movie is playing. Ticket availability was never an issue because unlike the Telugu movies, the patrons for these kinds of movies are fairly limited.

Our hearts used to beat faster when we see the studio title on the screen. This is not some lame Suresh productions or Ushakiran movies. They are some fancy names like universal and 21st century something, and they roll on to the screen in a fancy way. And the movie hasn’t even started yet!!

Soon we were immersed in the story. The actors were all equally unfamiliar to us. We didn’t know who the lead actors were supposed to be. This has one advantage, we didn’t had a clue who will die and who will survive in a monster/serial killer movie. As far as we were concerned, anything could happen.

The best part of watching dubbed movies is – the dubbing of course! It may look like a strange sight now watching these Caucasian actors speaking in Telugu, but it didn’t bother us. Things got interesting when the Telugu dialogue writers flexed their creative muscles and tried to slip in local references and Telugu swear words in between. I remember a movie where a side character’s catch phrase is “nee yankamma”. For a 12 year old kid, that’s hilarious!

The first dubbed movie I can recall watching is the magnificently titled “సాహస మోత్రా – సాగర గాడ్జిల్లా”. (Those were the post Jurassic Park years when some clever people decided to make some quick bucks by dubbing sundry Japanese monster movies. We didn’t mind one bit.). The plot involves a three-way fight between Godzilla, a Godzilla sized robot whose name is veera hanuman (yup), and a giant moth. If I remember correctly, it also had a fighter plane whose name is “Garuda” (all these a classic example of dubbing writers showing their creative side). Yes, the movie is every bit as ridiculous as it sounds. Yes, we had a blast watching it in a theatre.

Then there were the staple James Bond movies of the 90’s. Jagadeka Veerudu 007, he was called (as far as us 90’s dubbed movie patrons are concerned, Brosnan is THE bond. You can keep your fancy Sean Connerys and Daniel Craigs with yourself, thank you very much). And for us small town pre teenage kids, Bond movies also presented those exotic glimpses of the forbidden: heavily censored steamy scenes that we watched with equal mixture of guilt and glee.

Late nineties gave us Godzilla (what fun!), Anaconda (which was so successful it spawned a snake related b-movie deluge) and topped off with the biggest one of them all – The Mummy. Vivid memories of my childhood include my brother describing how gigantic a Godzilla really is and school mates whispering to each other about the “scene” in the beginning of Mummy. A standard practise was to paint the cleavage black on the posters. So the more black paint on posters, the more promise the movie held for us.

Gradually but inevitably, I have started outgrowing the dubbed movies. My interaction with them became limited to stumbling upon the posters and their advertisements in media while I download the shady torrent of the English version. The last dubbed movie I watched in theatre was Pirates of the Caribbean (SAMUDRAPU DONGALU), largely because the English version didn’t get a release in my town.

Now days, when I see trailers for dubbed movies, I laugh and make fun of them. But truth be told, deep inside there is a child who cheers for them and is grateful for their existence. I am not the target audience for them any more, but I am sure they are making some small town kid somewhere very happy.

Kosaru: Did you watch dubbed English movies as a child? What are the movies that you remember? Do let us know.