Srimanthudu Movie review

Srimanthudu - Telugu Movie review

Tag line - Old wine in new bottle with subtle presentation

Disclaimer: Views are strictly personal. Please notify any copy right infringements or if content is offensive. I may be using "he" mostly out of habit. He/She is what I mean.

If you are reading this review you either watched movie or looking for a review to support your views. Since movie released almost 3 weeks ago.

Story:
Harsha is son of a rich father who has a distaste for relatively poor people in money and status. Harsh on the other hand driven by universal well being and good morals. This is shown where he helps one of his company's loyal employees. He meets Charuseela at a birthday party and learns she is doing an agricultural course for developing villages through latest in agricultural technology. Instead of simply insulting her to express love, like in most Telugu movies, he promptly joins her college and becomes a sincere student. She feels ignored and presses him for answer. They start to develop liking towards each other and eventually fall in love. One day Charuseels casually learns who Harsha's father is and decides to keep him away. Harsha doesnt like it and while confronting her learns the reason is a village and finds his purpose in life. Rest on screen.

Analysis:
Koratala Siva must be commended for writing a script for Mahesh specifically. All dialogues are written to suit his style. In my personal opinion, Mahesh matured as an actor (and male with his voice, rugged looks and got rid of girlish manners) since Athadu. And peaked with Dookudu and 1-Nenokkadine (Which I liked a lot). Gladly for him and audience there is more scope to see his acting talent and he is awesome to watch. Be it Action emotion or comedy timing he absolutely nails it. This movie is completely written to suit his strengths and you will fall in love with his performance.

Surprisingly Shruthi Hasan has few dialogues and un-like other telugu films only one song to show navel and thighs. On the flip side she exposed enough in last song to compensate for missing item song (which is a norm these days). In fact, that last song is a bit contrast to the whole film. When you think there is no intentional skin show this songs comes like it is supposed get all money from "C" centers. She did really well and her expressions actually suit the situations - like after Mangrove fight. Rest of the cast is apt. Rajendra Prasad and JB are well suited for roles but don't have a lot of screen time. Mahesh takes most of screen time. 

Background Music is good. Songs are apt to situation other wise audio is not extra ordinary. Typical Devi Sri "Percussion" Prasad album. Not sure why they call him Rock Star now. Sometimes I wonder if this is the same guy who did "Nuvvu Nuvvu" in Khadgam.

Photography is excellent. Fights are routine except for Mangrove fight. That will be watched in youtube for few years if not a decade. Lyrics are good especially for Rama Rama.

When you leave the theater you feel like its an incomplete movie. Reason - our brain tuned to "run of the mill" movies. Comedian made stupid or slapped repeatedly in second half or DDLJ style hero lives with Villain and proves his stupidity. Or Hollywood/Korean movie ideas. I felt movie looked very polished in 1st half. They tried to make it as simple as possible. Even minister uses few cars instead of several hundred Sumo SUVs.

What I did not like:
Dance in Rama Rama song - What happened to "abhinayam"? when lyrics go like - "pada pada mani vantenesi penu kadali ni datinadu..." I see same repeated moves but nothing that sits well with lyrics. Mahesh is either lazy or simply can't dance (his dad had the same issue). But he needs to work on it. When he repeatedly talks about "convincing audience" I dont understand why dance would not convince audience.

Dhimmatirige song - This can be removed. Lyrics are OK (we heard worse). Unnecessary skin show spoiling the decent movie till that point. And Mahesh can't dance. Sorry Prince fans. He needs to work on this. He confessed in an interview that he is at his best fitness level now. May be he can join a Dance school now. 

VIllage issues - Instead of showing few scenes where Hero made difference hands-on, they simply show it in a song. rest of the time is allocated for "fights". 

Too many fights - When there is a message and presentation is simple why so many fights? So if in reality someone wants to adopt a village he must be ready to bash villains? Because I am sure there will be villains. This is why old movies showed Hero bringing revolution among villagers and eventually fighting as a group against baddies. 

Mahesh look - He looks slightly bulky in second half compared to first. Like most other Telugu heros he hastily becomes fit when needed. Telugu heros are still a long-way from Bollywood when it comes to fitness.They flaunt six pack or biceps in 1 or 2 movies and back to normal. They don't need to look beyond South India and Kamal hassan for acting,dance or fitness. 

Overall it is a good effort. Mahesh lived up to his fathers billing as Daring and Dashing. It is a bold decision after 1-Nenokkadine.