Appu re-release: Puneeth Rajkumar’s banner to distribute his debut film; up next Yuvarathnaa?

In 2024, when Puneeth Rajkumar’s Jackie was re-released for his birthday, Ashwini Puneeth Rajkumar, in association with KRG Studios, had announced that the next film to get yet another theatrical outing would be his debut, Appu . Buoyed by the response to the Jackie re-release, Karthik Gowda of KRG Studios had said that going forward, every year a Puneeth Rajkumar film would be back in theatres, and that work on digitally remastering Appu was underway.

Appu for Puneeth's 50th birth anniversary

According to the latest announcement, Appu will be back in theatres on March 14, as part of the 50th birth anniversary celebration. The actor’s birthday falls on March 17. This time, Ashwini will handle the distribution of the film, which was originally produced and distributed by the late actor’s grandmother, Parvathamma Rajkumar, under the banner Vajreshwari Combines.

Also read: Remembering Puneeth Rajkumar: 8 best movies of the late Kannada actor you need to watch 

Puneeth, who had worked as a child artiste, made the switch to leading man with Appu, a film directed by Puri Jagannadh. The film also introduced Rakshitha Prem as the heroine. Released on April 26, 2002, the film had a 200-day theatrical run, and was remade in Telugu (Idiot), Tamil (Dum), Bengali (Hero).

A love story, Appu had Puneeth as the title character, the son of a police constable. While the father dreams of making Appu an IPS officer, the latter runs into trouble with goons, and ends up in hospital, where, unbeknownst to him, a girl, Suchi (Rakshitha) donates blood and pays his bills. When he tracks her down and begins wooing her, it comes to light that she is the daughter of the city police commissioner, who is dead against their relationship. How Appu and Suchi overcome all the odds and unite forms the crux of the story.

Also read: Gandhada Gudi review: If James was an emotion, Puneeth Rajkumar’s dream project is an experience of a lifetime 

In his nearly 2 decade long career as a leading man, Puneeth had 30-odd films, including his last, James, which released posthumously. Fans have already begun urging Ashwini and director Santhosh Ananddram to bring Yuvarathnaa back to theatres, as the film had been heavily impacted by the pandemic restrictions and then headed to OTT within days. A proper theatrical release would do justice to the film, they reckon.