Blade Babji

Blade Babji is a 2008 Telugu comedy directed by Devi Prasad, who wrote it with Satish Vegesna. Allari Naresh plays a pickpocket who has to pose as a police officer to recover his own stolen loot, with Sayali Bhagat and Ruthika, and Koti composed the music. Inspired by the 1999 American film Blue Streak, it was released on 24 October 2008, did well at the box office, and was remade in Tamil and Kannada.

What the story is about

Babji, a pickpocket from Rajahmundry, sets himself a mission: raise ₹4 crore to save the slum dwellers of his area from a builder. He and his gang go to Vizag, rob a bank, and bury the money in a building under construction. That night they celebrate, fall asleep drunk on a boat, and wake up on their way to the Andaman Islands, stuck there for a month. When they finally get back, a police control room has been built right on top of the loot. To get at it, Babji kidnaps a newly posted officer, Krishna Manohar, and takes his place. He turns out to be rather good at police work, and soon has the commissioner offering him his daughter Archana’s hand. The chase for the money, which has a mind of its own, is the comedy of the film.

Cast and crew

• Allari Naresh as Blade Babji
• Sayali Bhagat as Archana
• Ruthika as Rani
• Venu Madhav as Balu
• Brahmanandam as Buchi Babu
• Srinivasa Reddy as SI Krishna Manohar
• Dharmavarapu Subramanyam as CI Simham
• Jaya Prakash Reddy as Banda Badri
• L. B. Sriram as Constable Edukondalu
• Krishna Bhagavaan as Dharma Rao, a mason
• Shankar Melkote as the police commissioner

Director: Devi Prasad. Music: Koti (Aditya Music). Production: Satya Movies. Runtime: 150 minutes.

Reviews

Sify rated it 3/5, saying the director “has come out with a good and interesting subject” and handled the narration well, with an “impressive” screenplay. Idlebrain.com also gave it 3/5 and called it a “decent comedy”, and 123Telugu.com (3.5/5) described it as a comedy of errors and praised Allari Naresh and the supporting cast.

Box office and remakes

The film was a success: Idlebrain included it among the top 14 Telugu films of 2008, and the trade site T2BLive credits it with a distributors’ share of ₹7 crore. It was remade in Tamil as Kasethan Kadavulada (2011) and in Kannada as Kiladi Kitty (2012).

Where to watch Blade Babji

We do not have a confirmed streaming listing for Blade Babji on file. If we verify one with a platform, it will appear on this page.

Sources: the Wikipedia article on Blade Babji and the reviews and reports it cites, linked above; our own cast and crew records.