Sai and Shujath talk Cinema

This was Kalyan Ram’s follow up to his surprise hit Athanokkade. He once again selects a debutant writer-director (Anil Krishna) to direct this revenge drama. Though it might seem to us that we have had enough of these tales of vengeance and retribution, telugu film directors and writers do not seem to think so. Kalyan Ram’s Athanokkade was also a revenge drama but director Surendar presented the movie with a lot of freshness and that resulted in its unexpected success. Though this movie has a couple of intriguing twists and turns, it is an average mass flick overall.

Kalyan Ram plays a student who falls in love with the daughter of a powerful mobster (yet again). He manages to convince her father with ease but when everything seems fine there is an attack on him. The rest of the story is about why he was attacked and what happens in the confrontation with his attackers. Anil Krishna manages to keep the audience interested by skillfully hiding from the audience the reason for the the attack. However, once the reason is revealed the movie goes downhill and finishes with banal and boring games of one-upmanship and some melodrama thrown in for good measure.

Kalyan Ram has improved since his debut film but there is more scope to sharpen his skills. He tries to portray a mass role (heavy dialogues and bashing hundreds of goons) and does fine. The debutant heroine Diya doesn’t have much to do except look good (which unfortunately she cannot as she is poor in the looks department). Somebody needs an eye checkup there. She is probably the worst (in my memory) since Raveena Rajput from NTR Junior’s debut film Ninnu Chudalani. Another notable member from the cast is Ravi Kale (Sarkar) who gets the role of a regular telugu film villain. The guy who plays his brother (Vinayagan) is quite good in the role of a psychotic and scary goon. The music (Chakri) of the film is ordinary and the action (Vikram Dharma) isn’t much to talk about.

Though Anil Krishna makes a decent first attempt, this isn’t enough to get him noticed. His work isn’t bad but he needs to do much better to make a successful film. If you haven’t been bored to death with hackneyed revenge dramas or if you are a Kalyan Ram fan, you might want to check this one out.