The Unsolicited Movie Review

Before I start my first ever movie review I’d like to make the rules of the review clear.

1. I’m not a movie freak, and not a fan to any actor/actress.
2. I’m not even a controlled movie freak, and still not a fan to any actor/actress.
3. I’m always trying not to hate (especially since I’m known to hate Lakshmi Manchu for producing Jummandhi Naadham and trying to rave about it on twitter streams).

Now that the three not’s have dilated the rules/assumptions, I’d get to the theme of this plot.

Yamla Pagla Deewana

Totally unexpected that I would run into this movie because I have always thought that Bobby Deol sucks; and completely thankful to those who suggested this movie to me. When I asked a colleague to come watch the movie with us, she said “Koi Pagla hi aaye us movie ko dekhne”; I smiled and now reluctantly agreed. Given their reputation who expects a decent movie from Sunny Deol these days? Now don’t get me started on Bobby Deol because that pawn doesn’t even trot.

The Deol trio had got together, marking the comeback of Dharmendra, and perhaps what should be the final attempt to revive the career – that never took off – of Bobby Deol. Though Dharmendra must be lauded for his performance at that age, and considering his comeback after a long time, he must understand that his son Bobby isn’t worth the time. Sunny Deol gave the audience what was expected of him: Masculinity and masculine dialogues. The chirping comedy that traversed throughout the movie was missing the essential timing in some cases, but overall was a great success, and generated the guffaws expected of this film. Oh, and did I mention the amazing comic timing of Anupam Kher? Nothing new, and everybody is bound to be on a laughter riot when the village politics scene is portrayed; which also turns out to be a tolerant mockery of our political system. And of course, the simple & beautiful Kulraj Randhwa did justice to her clichéd role.

Now another point worth mentioning is that the first 30 minutes were a total shocker, it nearly gave me nausea. In creating the rather lousy characters of Dharam paaji (Dharmendra) & Gajodhar (Bobby Deol), they created a mess that was totally outlandish, however at the end of the movie you won’t remember the vile beginnings the movie made. This was also the first time (for me) two item songs were played in the same film, and these were also played nearly back-to-back & were part of the first half hour, thankfully.

As soon as I came back from the movie I gave it a rating 3.0, and soon saw this conversation my Brother had with his roomies.

As soon as I saw that I realized two things:

1. My brother was talking about me (or my tweet on this movie).
2. His friend was right.

So now I reevaluated my scripts and the final rating for the movie is 2.75, without any regrets. So, if you are looking for a movie with just the entertainment quotient high – go for it, you won’t regret.

Anaganaga O Dheerudu (AOD)

As soon as I came back from the movie I tweeted this:

There are average movies. And there is "Anaganaga O Dheerudu" which is below that line. Yes. Below Average. Not recommended. #MovieRating 2.0

Not friendly at all, I understand. But I’d like to explain why I gave that.

Plot

A fantasy must have – at the least –a closely-knit gripping storyline, strong central characters, and a great villain. AOD has been promising all three of these ever since they started promoting it. AOD clearly lacked the first, tried to create the second (& failed at the borderline), and was very close to making it at the third requirement. Let us be clear about it, getting fantasy right is very difficult and very important; there must have been, after all, some reason why nobody tried such a fantasy-adventure in Tollywood too often. And

Now since everybody has been comparing AOD with Magadheera (MD) even before AOD released it would be fair for me where there are differences and where it shouldn’t be compared at all.

First of all, let us get the difference right: AOD is a fantasy-adventure, while MD comes in an Action/Drama package. Now the similarities for me end at the usage of graphics/visual effects. While people have been saying that this will redefine the way movie making is done in tollywood, I’d like to disagree: on an average Tollywood movie you can’t use the sort of visuals that Disney provided for AOD. MD had a tight storyline, and had great connections with the central theme and characters from two incarnations, while AOD failed at creating any sort of mystique. Other comparisons are juxtaposed with AOD’s individual characters’ characterizations.

Tanikala Bharani was totally underutilized, and Ali’s Lachimi getup has become bland by now.

Actors

Siddharth: Siddharth Looked naïve for his character. He was supposed to be a Yodha, and to be entirely honest there were only one or two moments when I felt so. Except, of course, when he was called by his name in the movie – which of course was Yodha. The only reason (I reckon) for such a name to the character is that Sid couldn’t symbolize/carry such a strong character by himself. Which is piss poor because (in media and the ballyhoo) Yodha has been continually been compared to Kala Bhairava portrayed by Ram Charan Teja, which is wrong at so many levels. Firstly, the characterization of Yodha didn’t sound strong at all, or it couldn’t be reflected on screen. Within minutes of introducing Kala Bhairava, we were mesmerized into believing that he could fight scores of men all alone, while Yodha always looked like an underdog, and his blindfolded character wasn’t strengthened enough visually. This is an important differentiating aspect in the climax fight of the two movies. In MD the climax fight was inspiring, whereas in AOD it was just a formality. Secondly, though Siddharth is a better actor when compared to Ram Charan Teja, his performance is much lower than his caliber when compared to what Ram Charan raised.

Shruti: Shruti Hassan, marking her tollywood debut, carried herself beautifully in the character of Priya. Some scenes that were supposedly romantic were jinxed by the apparent lack of chemistry with Sid. Individually, however, she outscored what was expected by her as a debutant. She was a fresh face, and came with a sensual touch to her character right from the beginning. Her face has the charm to keep both men and women equally interested, and she is the best find of this movie for Tollywood.

Lakshmi: Lakshmi Manchu marked her Tollywood debut with a negative role of Irendri in AOD. Just for taking such a leap of faith, she must be commended; however, she wasn’t up to the mark and looked totally out of place. Especially, given the hoopla she created over her twitter stream each day that everybody is applauding her work. She doesn’t have a great amount of expression required for such a class negative role – which also happens to be the best developed character of the movie. Most of the negative role was played by the make-up and graphics, both of which have nothing to do with her. I’m also certain, her director faced a lot of trouble in getting her act right. If you see carefully, she cannot use her lower body at all, almost as if paralyzed down the waist. This is clearly visible in the solo song she was gifted with – and the song has been wasted. Even in other scenes where she was supposed to deliver strong negativity, her expressions underperformed in comparison to her voice, which wasn’t compatible either. To be clear: she should have got someone else to dub her voice as well; Lakshmi’s voice isn’t mature enough to take on this role. Overall, adding some points for her courage to take on such a role: she just crossed the line of average.

Harshita: Harshita as Moksha, did what she could, but again like I mentioned, she wasn’t given enough power in her role to do something special, though she was supposed to be one of the pillars of the movie. Moksha’s role missed the aura & mystique that should have accompanied the characterization. The only aura that Moksha is granted is her butterflies. Sorry, when I watched the movie even kids in the hall didn’t like it.

Response

I overheard (actually heard) kids shouting “Lets go back mom, this is boring.” So painful to hear such things because they were supposed to be most impressed with the visuals. By interval, one kid deciphered “Magadheera was much better than this one”. I felt genuinely sorry for the filmmakers and these kids, equally.

My Rating: 2.0 (and I stand still).