Behind the screens
Manchu Manoj who is desperate to score a hit on silver screen after Bindas, teamed up with sandalwood director Pawan Wadeyar to turn Potugadu. Pawan is debuting in Telugu with the remake of sandalwood hit Govindaya Namaha, while Manoj himself is in full romantic mood with hot beauties Simran Mundi, Sakshi Chaudari, Anu Priya and Stacy who are ready to scorch on silver screen. Let us see what is the power of Potugadu on silver screen.

Story Line

Govindu (Manchu Manoj) hailing from traditional brahmin family turns play boy rather than intelligent boy contrary to expectations. He decides to commit suicide and selects a good location. On his suicide mission he meets Venkat (Posani Krishna Murali), a software engineer who plans to end his life due to love failure. After getting to know Venkat's love story, Govindu reveals the reason behind his suicide attempt. Govindu narrates his story which is full of romances with a brahmin girl Vaidehi(Simran Mundi),muslim girl  Mumtaz (Sakshi Chaudari), foreigner Stacy (Rachel) and Christian Mary (Anu Priya). To find out why Govindu who happily enjoying with four girls tries to commit suicide, one should watch the film on silver screen.

Star Shine

Manoj came out with a rocking performance. He showed his full power in this mass role. His comedy timing his perfect and in dialogue delivery his voice resembles his dad Mohan Babu. He should take care of his growing weight and also improve upon his expressions. Coming to debutantes all girls gout one song each with Manoj. Foreigner Rachel will endear herself to masses with her sizzling red hot treat on silver screen. She shed all her inhibitions with her out and out glamour treat. Sakshi Chaudari as a musilm girl got a meaty role. She shone in performance as well as acting. Even Anu Priya and Simran looked hot in their roles. Sunil with his voice over attracted all. Others like Shayazi Shinde, Ali, Vinod Kumar, Chandra Mohan, Satyam Rajesh, Srinivas Reddy,Tagubotu Ramesh got very small roles and they performed well.

Analysis
Director Pawan Wadeyar from the beginning said that script is the hero in his film. He proved it that with strong script and intelligent screenplay and direction, viewers will forget small mistakes and enjoy the film. He loaded the film with full comedy and except for ten minute fight in the climax and one in the middle, it is an out and out entertainer.

Pace of the film is quite good and never in the film there is one boring scene. When viewer feels bored the very next moment a comedy scene appears. Manoj after a long time selected a script that is suitable for him and he came out trumps. By having songs and dialogues targeting masses filmmakers made their intent clear. However only thing that goes negative is undue criticism of not one but all religions Hindus, Muslims and Christians. Everything depends on how they react. Some scenes in second half would have been handled in a more better way.

Technical

Production values are good. Achu Rajamani's music and songs are good. Background score is quite fine. Srikanth's cinematography is beautiful. MR.Varma's editing could have been better in the second half.

Movie Marks

Overall Potugadu is an enjoyable entertainer that you can watch!

Tags: Potugadu Movie Review,Potugadu Review,Potugadu Movie TALK

Story

Priya (Priya Bannerjee) lives in San Francisco with her parents but due to the strict restrictions from her parents and forced marriage, she runs away from house to commit suicide. Sunny (Adivi Sesh) comes to her rescue and makes her learn life is beautiful. In the short period, the duo falls in love and meanwhile, Priya’s parents and fiancée are in search of the lady. The rest forms the story.

Performances

Adivi Sesh looks good in few scenes and he performs well. Priya Banerjee looks bubbly and she plays her part convincingly.

Bharat Reddy is wasted in insignificant role, Shafi is noticeable, others weren’t upto the mark.

Technical analysis

Cinematography is classy and San Fransisco locales are beautifully captured. Music is okay while the background score could have been apt to the situational proceedings. Editing is pathetic. Lots of unnecessary scenes in the second half could have been trimmed down, Adivi Sesh scores in acting but as director he couldn’t leave his mark. Screenplay is awful. Production values are standard.

Analysis

Kiss story is routine while the screenplay is awful with inconsistent flow and loads of predictable scenes in the second half. The story moves on a boring note right from the word go and added to this the performances of supporting cast gets on to our nerves. Neither the comedy works nor the romantic scenes between the leads work for the Kiss film instead it makes the audiences loose patience and look for climax. Kiss has little entertainment but it goes in vain due to the staleness and illogical sequences. Editor should have sharpened his scissors to trim down unnecessary stuff especially the dragging scenes in the second half. The narration is dragging while the presentation is unconvincing giving an amateur attempt.

Final Verdict

Amateur attempt by Adivi Sesh

Tags: Kiss Movie Review,Kiss Telugu Movie Review,Kiss Review

Release date : 06 Sep 2013
Ratings : 3.25/5.0
Producer : Puneet Prakash Mehra, Sumeet Prakash Mehra
Director : Apoorva Lakhia
Music Director : Meet Bros Anjan Ankit, Anand Raj Anand
Starring : Ram Charan, Priyanka Chopra, Sanjay Dutt..

After Amitabh Bachchan’s movies like Don and Agneepath getting a remake in bollywood, director Apoorva Lakhia has come up with yet another remake of Big B’s cult hit Zanjeer. Starring the heartthrob of Tollywood in Ram Charan, Zanjeer also has Sanjay Dutt and Priyanka Chopra in other lead roles. The movie has released simultaneously in both Hindi and Telugu worldwide and lets see how it is.
Vijay Khanna (Ram Charan) is a sincere police officer who often gets transferred because of his upright attitude. It is after he comes to Mumbai, that he comes across a case in which a oil mafia don, Teja (Prakash Raj) is involved.
On the other hand Mala (Priyanka Chopra) is an NRI who comes to Mumbai to attend a friend’s wedding. One fine day she witnesses a murder involving Teja and his team.
Mala becomes a sole witness in this high profile murder and Vijay approaches Mala to help him in the case. As Vijay starts digging deep into the case, he comes across Sher Khan (Sanjay Dutt) who in turns helps him getting closer to Teja. Rest of the story is as to how Vijay manages to crack the high profile case and get Teja behind the bars.
Though Ram Charan had the daunting task of fitting into Big B’s shoes in his Bollywood debut, he has done a decent job. His action sequences and angry looks manage to create an great impact on the audiences.
Priyanka, as usual, looks glamorous and brings the oomph factor in the film. Sanjay Dutt as Sher Khan, plays his part with utmost sincerity.
The work done on the looks of each character is praise-worthy. Some action sequences look authentic and the whole set up of the movie looks contemporary.
While history suggests that remakes don’t usually create the same impact as the original, same is the case with Zanjeer too. Though Apoorva Lakhia manages to get the set up right, he messes it up with his execution.
The film has too much of violence as we can see Ram Charan smashing and beating up goons all throughout the movie. Prakash Raj is nothing like Ajit from the original flick. The talented actor is totally wasted in the movie.
Mahie Gill, who portrays the role of Mona, is again extremely uncanny. Another actor who turns out to be a disappointment is Atul Kulkarni. He has gone too over the top with his sequences.
Technical aspects :
Even though Apoorva had a ready made plot in hand, he couldn’t make use of it efficiently. The songs do not leave any impact at all and are placed in wrong places in the film. Background score of the film is a bit weak.
Some scenes in the movie are not well connected and also confuse the viewers at one point.The first half feels dragged, but the second half is short and snappy.
As mentioned earlier, Apoorva Lakhia gets the set up and look of the film right. He has nicely woven the same old angry young police officer story in today’s contemporary scenario.
On a whole, Zanjeer does not manage to create the magic of the original, but keeping all those inevitable comparisons aside it can be given a shot for contemporary set up and stylish action.

Tags:  Zanjeer  Movie Review,Zanjeer  Movie Reviews,Zanjeer Hindi Movie Review,Zanjeer Hindi Movie Review, Toofan Movie Review & Ratings, Zanjeer movie liveupdates

Story

Mallika (Charmee) is a call girl, who makes an accident with her car in a drunk state dashing 1 writer Lalith(Rahul) after which she joins the latter in a hospital with the help of her friend Vamshi (Rao Ramesh). Lalith loses his eye sight and Mallika takes him to her home and digs deep into his life with which he reveals about his story about a singer Swathi and his love. Rest of the story concludes with Mallika helping for Lalith’s love.

Performances

Filmmakers have projected this as Charmi’s woman-centric film but she had hardly scope for any role. She looked good in the two songs. Her own dubbing didn’t work in anyway.

Rahul and Saranya fails to grab the audiences interest with their bad acting. Despite performance scope character as a blind, Rahul fails to impress.

Rao Ramesh, Chandra Mohan are wasted, Thagubothu Ramesh provides some comic relief, Ravi Babu, Surekha Vani filled the screens.

Technical Analysis

Music by Praveen and Posham is pretty mediocre. Awachamaina has good lyrics but the misplacement of song tests the viewers patience. Re-recording is okay in parts. Cinematography is nothing to boast of, Editing is pathetic. Production Values are poor.

Analysis

Charmi looked beautiful in the film and she has got good screen presence but her role is limited and she just stays for first half an hour wrapping up her two songs and will appear only in the climax. Charmi’s role looked like an extended cameo. Prema Oka Maikam fails miserably in narration and presentation. Dialogues lack depth and look forcible; screenplay is inconsistent and quite predictable. Direction is pretty poor and one hour into the film, the plot goes off track highlighting supporting characterizations essayed by amateur actors. The film doesn’t provide any thrilling moments instead reminds us of many other films including the recent release Pavitra, Nuvvu Vastavani et al. The climax scenes are highly predictable and lacks interest.

Final Verdict

Prema Oka Maikam trailers, posters are misleading delivering wrong impression as Charmi’s woman-centric film. Still, it’s badly executed film. Stay away!!!

Prakash Jha's "Satyagraha" bears no thematic relation to any of his earlier political dramas. It is certainly not a sequel to his "Raajneeti", as has been reported in some sections of the media. And yes, it is most certainly based on the movement that Anna Hazare started against corruption. To say that Mr. Bachchan's character Dwarka Anand in "Satyagraha", lovingly called Dadujee by one and all, and Dadujee's turbulent relationship with the go-getting NRI-turned-Gandhian-nationalist Maanav Raghvendra(Devgn) does not bear a resemblance to the Anna Hazare-Arvind Kejriwal equation, would be plain blindness.

What Jha and his very able astute and politically informed co-writer and long-time collaborator Anjum Rajabali have done, is to collect together the thematic threads of Anna Hazare's mass anti-corruption movement and weave it into a gripping, thoughtful, hard-hitting and inspirational drama which contains all the resonances of a newspaper headline, and wrap it up in the semantics of cinema with as little creative violence as possible even while addressing an inherently violent issue.

From the time Jha made his intensely political drama "Damul", there has been a constant strife between the director's personal political ideology and its rendition into cinematically interpreted language. Drama and emotions have always been Jha's bete noire. In his predominantly brutal domain of interpersonal politics, the human drama is played out austerely, often at the cost of squandering away the chance to draw the characters' innerscape in an elaborately-charted schem .

In Jha's "Aarakshan", we had seen that trademark emotional austerity in the way he portrayed Mr. Bachchan's relationship with his screen-daughter Deepika Padukone. In "Satyagraha", one feels the relationship between Mr. Bachchan's character and his widowed daughter-in-law (Amrita Rao) could have gone a little further. But then Mr. Bachchan is the kind of extraordinary actor who can say so much about his character's emotional environment in the most meagre playing-time. Here, he has that one moment with Amrita Rao when hearing her sob in the dead of the night, he goes into her room to console her... And we know the kind of deep bonding this powerful patriarch shares with his cruelly widowed Bahu.

There is little time for emotions in Jha's world of politics and national awakening. Dwarka Anand gets just one sequence to show how much he misses his son. It's the moment when he returns to the scene of his son's death... The father's anguish here is palpable, throbbing with unexpressed grief. And then before we can wallow in the moment, Jha's editor Santosh Mandal mercilessly tears us away from this poignant scene of a father's loss.

In my favourite sequence, Mr. Bachchan shares a son-like camaraderie with Devgn's character telling him how he would miss Devgn when he leaves the next day. It is a deeply contemplative moment where Devgn reacts to Mr. Bachchan's supple emotions with rare care and attention.

Hold on to these infrequent episodes of emotional expression in this turbulent tale of awakening the nation's conscience where there is no room for individual's self-indulgence. In fact, Devgn's growing fondness for the TV journalist Yasmin Ahmed(Kareena Kapoor, lighting up every frame) and the sudden burst of a acutely romantic song seems to belong to some other time-zone.

You see, there's the business of the country's future to be attended to. And who better at creating a cinema of socio-political reform than Prakash Jha? The director constantly wrenches away from his individuals' personal feelings to focus on the broader picture.

Jha's narration gets busy with the business of swooping down on huge crowds of anxious restless people looking for a way out of the country's scam-frozen destiny. It's a world built on the premise of socio-political reform that Mahatma Gandhi and Jayaprakash Narain dreamt of and Anna Hazare attempted to bring to fruition.

There's an abundance of references to mobilisation of youth power through the Internet and mobile. "Satyagraha" probes and questions the validity and motivation of any mass movement that is born out of an inividual's genuine passion for reform. The pitfalls of such a mass movement are brought into play with a vingery mixture of broad drama and subtle humour.

It is no coincidence that the film's arch-villain is a politiciam portrayed as a kind of evil clown. Manoj Bajpayee plays the scummy 'scammy' brazely corrupt politician with lipsmacking relish. His smirky villainous neta act works as a perfect foil to Mr. Bachchan's controlled never overdone messianic act.

Devgn, in the all important role of the ambitious entrepreneur who becomes a catalyst for social change, could have taken his character much further down the road of self-articulation. On the other hand, Arjun Rampal has limited scope as a goonda-turned-self-appointed youth leader. He has great fun sinking his teeth into the rustic accent and boorish body language.

While the three main actors play off with each other with supple grandeur, some other supporting actors and characters are played at much too broad a pitch to be effective. When a corrupt policeman takes off his uniform to join the mass movement, you feel the script is teetering dangerously towards over-idealism.

But the message must be, and is, loud and clear. It is time for the nation to chase away damnation before it's too late. Jha's film is a timely wakeup warning, a massive clarion call for the conscience, brilliantly manifested in Prasoon Joshi's title song which tells us enough is enough, and listen... getting Gandhian on the cancerous community of corrupt politicians is a symptom of cowardice.

"Satygraha" conveys the uncontrollable anger and energy of a nation on the brink. For telling it like it is and for creating a compelling film out of the raw material of present-day corruption, the film deserves a standing ovation.

Story

Anil (Sumanth Ashwin) goes to Hyderabad from Rajahmundry after his mom (Rohini) keeps pestering him to get married. Anil does not like arranged marriage and with his father (Rao Ramesh) support he goes off to Hyderabad. He comes across Ananya (Eesha) in Hyderabad and falls for her, who makes greetings and artwork. Ananya falls for him but her parents (Ravi Babu and Madhubala) goes through marital crisis and this worries the girl in taking her relationship forward while similar worries of their relationship bothers Anil too. The duo later comes up with the idea of secret live-in relationship to take a compatibility test and the rest forms the story.

Performances

Sumanth Ashwin as Anil delivers a decent performance. He shows a remarkable improvement in emotional scenes and dialogue delivery compared to his debut Tuneega Tuneega. He impresses as a dancer as well.

Eesha is good looking and plays her role convincingly. Her chemistry with Sumanth Ashwin works out, which is the much needed factor for romantic entertainers.

Madhubala who made her comeback after a long gap is a show stealer. Rohini and Rao Ramesh are classy in their performances while Ravi Babu and Jhansi are impressive. Srinivas Avasarala entertains with witty one-liners. The film had an impressive casting.

Technical Analysis

PG Vindha’s cinematography is on top-class while Kalyani Malik’s music is melodious and impressive . Indraganti Mohan Krishna succeeds as a writer and director. The dialogues are quite impressive. Screenplay thrives in freshness and is engaging. Editing of the film is neatly done and art direction is good and the production values are rich.

Analysis

Anthaka Mundu Aa Tarvatha is an urbane romantic entertainer in Indraganti Mohan Krishna’s trademark style with clean entertainment. He succeeds as a director as well as writer. The film is Indraganti’s take on why life after wedding is not the same as before despite love marriage for many. The scenes are relatable; the story/concept is fresh, narration is simplistic yet the screenplay is engaging with matured handling.

The performances, lead pair chemistry, music, dialogues complement the film’s story. The first half offers entertainment with good one-liners while the second half is more of emotional scenes. The climax has been very well handled and is heart of the film though the pace has dropped in the post-interval scenes.

Final Verdict

Anthaka Mundu Aa Tarvatha is a well-handled matured love story… Sensible effort by director Indraganti Mohan Krishna

Story:
Satruvu (Kishore), Abhi (Naveen Chandra) and their dalam of 20 other naxalites are brought to a city prison.  The grim looking group get down as the handheld camera moves around giving us only glimpses of the group members even though the actors included Tagubothu Ramesh, Dhanraj and other known faces. When the long free flowing shot finally had a cut I’ve realized that this film won’t be dull (technically) like the rest of ours.
The group surrendered in the hope of rehabilitation, but, are cheated and now face the fury of the naxal hating jailer (Harshavardhan). Soon one of them is encountered after being tortured for information. Satruvu is then blackmailed into accepting an offer to operate as a police supported mafia, to get to the criminals the police can’t get to.
One deal ends up with Abhi kidnapping Shruti (Piya Bajpai) to get to her dad (a broker of some sort) and he has her to look forward to in the otherwise all male company. The group seems to be enjoying their new role and the killing montages, all seems well, until a new police superintendent (Abhimanyu Singh) walks in and kills two guys from the group, and one of them is about to get married so…..you know the old trick of ending a character just when it seems happy, it was that one. The new superintendent and the tension around the killing of a local MLA drives the dalam back to the forests to escape slaughter.
By far, the real star of the show was the low key cinematography. The long takes and the charm of the camera movement was more than what any of the stiff actors had to offer. And especially with long takes it needed actors who can really make you believe in the world on screen. Starting with Naveen Chandra the actors ruined for me many beautiful compositions and pans. Even an actor as accomplished as Kishore couldn’t do much with the empty dialogue and clichéd characterizations.

Verdict:
Dalam is the classic example of film picking a central idea that needs much research and awareness and trying to mould it into a masala archetype.Such films run the danger of failing at both ends. Luckily for first time director Jeevan Reddy that didn’t happen, completely. The seriousness it deserves was not up to the mark, then again, technically it was polished enough to convince you otherwise.

Director Teja has given some blockbuster hits in the past, but off late his films have not clicked at the box office. He is now back with his upcoming film ’1000 Abaddalu’. Starring Sai Ram Shankar and Ester in lead roles, the movie also has Naga Babu in an out and out comedy role. 1000 Abaddalu has released today in Andhra Pradesh



Story:-

Satya(Sai Ram Shankar) is the owner of an advertising company. He happens to fall in love with Satya (Esther), who shares his name. But he comes to know that she is already engaged. Following his heart, he plans to woo her with the help of his friends. He cooks up a lot of lies and finally ends up marrying her.
Just when everything seems to be going fine, the wife realises that she has been duped with a lot of lies. The couple go through major problems and get separated.
Will Satya cook some more lies to bring his wife back ?Or will he win her heart with his true love. That forms the story.

Plus Points:-

Naga Babu is the biggest asset of the film. He plays the role of Tower Star, a lover boy who is madly in love with Esther. Though he does not have a major role, he manages to entertain whenever he appears on the screen. His comedy timing is awesome and Teja has exploited it to the best.
Sai Ram Shankar has done a decent job. Comedy is good in places, especially in the second half. Some scenes, where Sai Ram Shankar woos the heroine with lies, have been executed nicely.

Minus Points:-

Except for some comedy bits, the rest of the film is quite stale and routine. The climax block seems very slow, with unnecessary scenes. Some of the scenes can be edited out, to reduce the run time.
Logic is missing, especially in the second half. Two songs in the second half are badly placed and spoil the flow of the film. The family drama scenes do not appear natural.
The heroine’s characterization is not up to the mark. Esther needs to work on her acting skills. She could not carry the role convincingly.
Technical Aspects:
Teja always manages to extract decent music from his music directors. Even in 1000 Abaddalu, the music is quite OK. Two songs in the first half are good. Camera work is nice, especially in all the song sequences.
Dialogues written for Naga Babu are hilarious. Teja’s direction is mediocre in this film.

Verdict:-
Though Teja always says that he wants to make ‘different’ films, he ends up making routine flicks. 1000 Abaddalu can be watched only for Naga Babu. Otherwise, there is nothing much for the viewer in this film.

Tags: 1000 Abaddalu Movie Review,1000 Abaddalu telugu Movie Review,1000 Abaddalu Movie Ratings,1000 Abaddalu Movie Talk,1000 Abaddalu Movie Live Updates,1000 Abaddalu Movie Story,1000 Abaddalu

Story:

Adda opens with stylish entry by Abhi [Sushanth] a youngster specialized in creating rifts between lovers to raise money. Shanvi [Priya] approaches Abhi seeking a help for her sisters’s love marriage with Avasarala Rambabu. Meanwhile, duo starts liking each-other and a predictable twist is here. Actual story starts when Abhi writes a love letter to Priya and she gets impressed. How will Abhi manage to win Priya’s heart is climax of Adda.

Performance:

Sushanth has touched fox’s tail for tremendous openings that happened due to postponement of Attarintiki Daredi. While the actor’s expressions were ok, his dance knowledge helped him to go well with songs and the dialogue delivery needs an expression change with each.

Shanvi has given her best, as Priya she is a glam doll and feast to watch on screen.

Rest of the cast, Raghubabu, Jayaprakash Reddy, Dhanraj, Venu and Thagubothu Ramesh has done their parts well.

Shwetha Bharadwaj is hot in the item number and Special appearances by Nagarjuna and ANR in ‘Endukey’ song are appealing.

Technical Analysis:

Sai Karthik’s debut may not go well with all centers of audiences, as the script is not quite enthralling and slow paced narration. Somehow, his screenplay gelled with audiences specially teenagers.

Anoop Rubens musicals have helped the movie. Even though the choreography elevated the audio, few tracks were wasted.

Arun Kumar’s cinematography is ok. Editing could have been done better, as the climax and pre-climax appears to be exhausted.

Analysis:

Sushanth’s Adda is a drag for simple script with predictable twists. Debutant director Sai Karthik is potent that he made audiences to sit with his screenplay and comedy bits here and there. While the movie is not so gripping, climax and pre-climax scenes doomed.

Anoop Rubens scores are appealing but were placed untimely and few wasted. Sushanth is watchable with trendy look and Shanvi is an asset for Adda. First half is quite entertaining compared to the second because of one-liners and comic scenes.

Totally, crispy one-liners, dance and few songs are the highlights of Adda.

Final Verdict:

Watch Adda for one-liners, cheerful first half with good work by Anoop Rubens, if you are free this weekend...

Vijay (Srini), and his friends Siva, Balaji and Salim, work in same office. Two days before Vijay's wedding to his girl friend (Sandhya), they all play cricket together, while playing the match Vijay falls down to the ground and he starts behaving differently. Doctor says he is suffering from temporary memory loss. Vijay's friends bring him to his home next day but they hide the fact that he's suffering from memory loss. And drama follows.

Analysis

Pusthakamalo Konni Pageelu Missing is remake of an highly acclaimed Tamil film - Naduvula Konjam Pakkatha Kaanom. It has a novel storyline (written by Tamil director Balaji Tharaneetharan) and offers interesting screenplay with lighthearted moments. The film is about a guy who loses memory (temporary loss).

Very thin plot point but it is very tough to handle such a simple (yet new) storyline. That is where the original writer and the Telugu version's director Sajid Qureshi get brownie points. The director has handled the movie in effective manner and with good humor.

It is a fun film about friendship. Though many scenes defy the logic, second half is hilarious and keeps you glued to the screen till the end. I have not seen the Tamil movie, so I don't go into comparisons with the original movie.  The use of one dialogue - "Emaindi, O Nuvve Kada kottindi, ball gallo lechindi .." - throughout the movie by the protagonist is quite effective.

On downside, it misses the logic in many scenes and stretched unnecessarily. Item song in the second half is totally unnecessary.

Performances

Srini (of Ee Rojullo fame) is suited well to the role. The role demands him to look innocent and he has managed to carry the same look till the end. But the actors who played his friends who make the film more interesting with their performances. All the three guys have done superb job. Mast Ali, known for Hyderabadi movies, is apt in his role of Salim. Supraja has not much to do in the film but she is okay. Raghu Babu provides some laughs.

Cinematography (Martin Joe) and music is neat. Debutant director Sajid Quereshi shows promise.

Final Verdict:

An off-beat jolly comedy film. It truly has different plot and is very engrossing till the end though a little long. Watch it for its novelty.