Liger

<p>After his father, Balram Agarwal’s death, in the National Championship, Sashwath Agarwal aka Liger (reference for Lion and Tiger) and his mother Balamani move to from . Balamani is determined to turn Liger into a MMA champion and takes him to a coach named Christopher, who trains him. While Liger is on his way to perfection in the sport, he meets a rich young woman, Tanya, and falls in love with her. After learning from her brother Sanju that Liger has a stammering problem, Tanya, apparently embarrassed, leaves him. Liger wins the national championship after getting motivated by the rejection. He moves on to participate in the International Championship, sponsored by Sanju and Tanya’s father. Liger wins every match and moves on to the finals. However, Tanya is kidnapped days before the finals. Upon getting to know of this, Liger confronts Tanya’s father. He reveals that he borrowed money from a gangster to set up his business and remains helpless as he could not repay the money back to him. After her father reveals that Tanya broke up with Liger so he could focus on his sport and career after his mother chastised her for being a distraction, Liger decides to save Tanya by himself, which ultimately causes him to miss the final match. He stumbles upon the kidnapper, who happens to be Mark Anderson, his lifelong role model and a legendary MMA fighter. Anderson challenges him to a fight to get Tanya back. The fight is live streamed at the MMA final. When Liger is on the verge of losing, he remembers the advice that his mother gave him and defeats Anderson. Impressed by his skills, Anderson takes a picture with Liger and Tanya and lets them go. As a result of the successful fight, the MMA jury declares the fight between Anderson and Liger as the final match. Liger becomes a MMA World Champion. who plays a fighter with a , underwent a dramatic physical transformation for his role and went to for training. After refused the offer due to dates issues, was cast opposite Deverakonda. The film’s score is composed by . Composer is also signed for the film. In September 2021, boxer was signed for an extended cameo, thus making his acting debut in . Filming began on 20 January 2020 in , with the tentative title . 40 days of shoot was completed when production was halted in March 2020 due to the . The filming resumed in February 2021. The second schedule was shot in . The filming was delayed again in April 2021 due to the second wave of the COVID-19 lockdown. The cast and crew resumed the shoot in September 2021. In November 2021, the cast and crew went to to shoot the portions with Mike Tyson. The filming was completed in February 2022. The music rights are sold to . The first single titled “The Liger Hunt Theme” was released on 9 May 2022, on the occasion of Vijay Deverakonda’s birthday. The second single titled “Akdi Pakdi” was released on 11 July 2022. The third single titled “Waat Laga Denge” sung by Vijay Deverakonda was released on 29 July 2022. The fourth single titled “Aafat” was released on 6 August 2022. The fifth single titled “Coka 2.0” was released on 12 August 2022. was released on 25 August 2022 in Hindi and Telugu along with dubbed versions in Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada. Earlier in January 2021, the film’s release date of 9 September 2021 was announced . But due to production delays caused by , the film was postponed. The current release date was announced in December 2021. The film’s worldwide theatrical rights were valued at crore, the highest for any Deverakonda film. The satellite rights of the film have been acquired by , while the digital rights for streaming have been acquired by . The film was digitally streamed on Disney+ Hotstar from 22 September 2022 in Telugu and dubbed versions of Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada languages. The Hindi version premiered on 21 October 2022. and Sri Karthikeya Cinemas has acquired All India distribution rights while Sarigama Cinemas and Phars Film Co acquired overseas distribution rights. received negative reviews from critics. On the website , of 13 critics’ reviews are positive, with an average rating of 2.2/10. Neeshita Nyayapati of rated the film 2 out of 5 stars and wrote, “It’s ironic that is asked to focus multiple times in the film, but the script itself lacks the same focus.” Janani K of rated the film 2 out of 5 stars and wrote, ” is a convoluted sports drama with a lacklustre story. In other words, Liger is a wasted opportunity.” Arvind V of rated the film 2 out of 5 stars and wrote, “The performances are mixed at best. Vijay Deverakonda is measured and earnest.” Sonil Dedhia of rated the film 1.5 out of 5 stars and wrote, “Liger seems so long that by the end, I started feeling why did I get into this Aafat.” She also called Deverakonda’s performance as repetitive and tiresome. Sudhir Srinivasan of rated the film 1.5 out of 5 stars and called it ‘a crossbreed between cringe and .’ He added, “The kicks and punches in Puri Jagannadh’s weakly written Liger seem directed at us.” A reviewer for rated the film 1.5 out of 5 stars and wrote, “On the whole, Liger fails to impress due to its silly and bizarre narrative and poor writing. At the box office, it will have a tough time attracting the audience to cinemas.” of rated the film 1 out of 5 stars and wrote, “There’s nothing new or fresh about the ingredients that go into the making of this . The plot is filled with all kinds of outlandish situations, and the treatment is jaded.” of rated the film 1 out of 5 stars and wrote, ” is massive mess of a movie that Vijay Deverakonda’s newfangled physique and action chops cannot salvage.” of rated the film 1 out of 5 stars and wrote, “Director Puri Jagannadh’s off-putting humour and ridiculous ambitions ensure is a dead duck from the word go.” Suresh Bishnoi of cinereveal.com rated the film 1.5 out of 5 stars and wrote, “The film presents a fine example of action choreography, but casting, acting and direction is so sick.” of rated the film 1 out of 5 stars and called the film ‘a disappointment of colossal portions.’ Sanyukta Thakare of rated the film 0.5 out of 5 stars and said, “0.5 is for the longest fight montage I have even seen, also only good part of the movie.” of rated the film 0 out of 5 stars and wrote, ” overflows with the signature tackiness of Puri Jagannadh’s films and the misogyny that Vijay Deverakonda has proudly worn on his sleeve since he struck box-office gold with Arjun Reddy.” Sanjukta Sharma of noted in her review, “Devarakonda has the swagger of a testosterone bomb but has no consistence in his impersonation of either the lover or the fighter. is an example of how cringe-worthy big Bollywood can get to resuscitate ticket sales. This attempt is out-and-out a lost case of such desperation.” Monika Rawal Kukreja of wrote in her review, “Puri Jagannadh’s Liger is extremely flawed and below average for the hype it created.” She added that the film is devoid of any coherent plot, performances, or action that does not involve the hero strutting in slow-motion. Shomini Sen of in her review noted, “Lots of mindless action sequences, arbitrary songs and a story that lacks logic- feels like an ordeal to sit through.” grossed worldwide on its opening day including crore from and , with a distributor share of crore including crore from overseas market. On second day it collected ₹7.7 crore worldwide, on third and fourth day it collected ₹6.55 crore and ₹5.24 crore respectively. So on the weekend it collected India net ₹35.44 crore and ₹48.5 crore worldwide gross.and on fifth day it collected ₹1.5 crore. performed poorly at the . Latha Srinivasan of attributed the film’s failure to over-hyped promotions and audience expectations. Writing for , Abhimanyu Mathur stated that the film’s team tried to manufacture a by casting actors from and failed. In October 2022, reported that the film has collected a total worldwide gross of crore with a distributors’ share of crore. Thus, the film incurred a total loss of crore.</p>