'Aaptha Mithra' continues its amazing run

Bangalore, Feb 17 (IANS) While "Aaptha Mithra" holds on to the top slot this fortnight, "Ayya" overtakes other contenders to take second place.

The top five Kannada films are:

1. "Aaptha Mithra": The film has already completed a silver-jubilee run in six major cities and film industry circles feel it may run for a year. Even in the silver- jubilee week, collections from Bangalore city crossed Rs.600,000.

2. "Ayya": The film has had a fantastic opening. It may collect over Rs.4 million in the first week in Bangalore city and Rs.1.5 million in Mysore, Mandya and Hassan centres. The film was released on Feb 11 throughout Karnataka. The good opening is attributed to the hero-director combination. For action hero Darshan, the big initial success of "Ayya' is only a consolidation of his present status as the most popular young Kannada star.

3. "Kalasi Palya": The film is all set to complete a silver- jubilee run in Bangalore city. Though the collections have dropped in some urban centres, the film is continuing to do wonders in smaller centres like Periyapatna, Hiriyur and Doddaballapura. This is the biggest hit of Darshan's career.

4. "Rishi": This Shivaraj Kumar-Vijaya Raghavendra-starrer directed by Prakash is slowly and steadily marching towards greater success, at least in the Bangalore and Mysore urban centres. Industry analysts feel it is too classy to achieve success in rural and semi-urban areas.

5. "Joke Falls": The medium-budget film starring Ramesh Arvind is creating waves in Bangalore and Mysore. In both the centres, the film is still going strong and expected to complete 100 days. It is also doing well in the PVR multiplex.