July 8, 2006

vethalu teerchu maa deaveri
vaedamanti maa godaari
sabari kalasina godaari
rama charita ke poodari

On the onset, I was pleasantly surprised by the movie. Sometimes, when you get something, that you were subconsciously longing for a while, you just cannot stop raving about it. As soon as I came out of the movie, I realized my thirst for a realistic, yet entertaining telugu movie, has been quenched. True to his word ( ee vesavi challaga untundi), Sekhar Kammula has really delivered it with a bang. Its a breath of fresh air. Its a pinch of your daily life on celluloid. For some, its nostalgia and for others, its their story on the silver screen.

Sekhar Kammula stuck to the basics of film making. Its heartening to see a young director having such a promise. Just when the telugu people have given up on finding another Bapu, here comes some fresh blood who can make as good a movie, if not better. He has the class and the sensibilities of a great director. And, above all, he has the honesty and conviction to stick to his style that bodes well for the future of telugu cinema.

Sekhar Kammula has a fascination for female's psyche. Nature needs balance and that is depicted in the famous words as prakriti-purushudu . Even though we have a pantheon of hindu goddesses, we somehow fail to acknowledge the balance provided by the women in our culture. Somewhere down the line, our filmmakers have started to believe that a man can totally carry the movie on his shoulders, due to which, we stumbled more often than not. Here comes a movie where the director gives his heroine all the different shades and importance to strike the much needed balance. In the end, you see a quality product that tends so much more towards the realm of believability, that most of us can identify with our lives.

Sumanth was a revelation in this film. He just lived the role and I hope he goes places in the future, if he were to choose sensible directors and good roles. In a nutshell, beautiful lyrics, great music, wonderful cinematography and above all , great direction makes this a must see for every sensible , telugu person.

Sridhar Srigiriaju : Mclean, VA
[email protected]