My father used to say it is very tough to make a film with Pawan Kalyan as the expectations are humongous. Interestingly, over the years, people have started to compare him with Rajnikanth who has a similar predicament.
The movie ‘Attarintiki Daredi’ is designed to meet these expectations and succeeds in this objective. Pawan Kalyan as Gautam Nanda is in his elements and offers all that he has come to be known all these years. His mannerisms, his unique dialogue delivery, his outlook to life both on-screen and off-screen…all of it is displayed in great splendor. Let it be the opening scene where he knocks off commandos with ease, or the scene where he walks out of a Jaguar to enter his Atta’s house for the first time or the comedy scenes with the heroines or the emotional scenes with his grandfather or the climax, the aura of Pawan Kalyan takes these moments to the next level.
While the first half caters to class audience, the second half is replete with scenes that will have the front benchers go wild. Sequences with Brahmanandam, bring that mass flavor to the film whose main plot is sensible and sober.
Writer-Director Trivikram must be appreciated for the choice of the theme and depicting Atta (aunt) in such a dignified manner. South Indian cinema over the years trashed the characterization of Atta in the name of cheap comedy and has reached its nadir with Megastar’s “Alluda Majaka”. His characterization and the portrayal by Nadia are both praiseworthy.
Trivikram also scores heavily for his treatment of the emotional scenes, and his dialogues convey pages of meaning in just a few lines. When the movie reaches climax, and Pawan Kalyan holds center stage, there won’t be a single Telugu understanding soul who will not be moved by the terrific combination of the dialogues and acting.
Boman Irani brings a certain freshness to the grandfather’s character just like Nasser did in ‘Athadu’. Rao Ramesh gets to play a similar role like that of his father in ‘Gharana Mogudu’ (Both aid to the plot point of Hero’s entry into heroine’s/atta’s house) and he does a commendable job. Samantha provides a delectable mix of cuteness and glamour and proves her worthiness of Gautam Nanda’s affection.
Ali is the pick of the comedians with his superb timing and his antics in the ‘Kevvu Keka’ song. Brahmanandam’s character is probably designed to cater to the masses and he does his best to live up to his recently acquired image of hero-must-beat-Brahmanandam-at-any-cost. In this movie, Pawan Kalyan does not need any intonation like “Hit me haard yaar” to beat and bite Brahmi.
It is the scenes with Brahmanandam that make you wonder if the Director Trivikram had to take a back seat in the effort to a churn out a wide audience appealing blockbuster. The finesse he shows in handling emotional scenes seems missing in the comedy scenes. Like the great Jandhyala who used to repeat most of his tracks in his films, Trivikram seems to suffer from the same malady, which has not reached a ‘critical’ stage yet.
Trivikram also takes several liberties with logic, the most notable of them is corporate affairs. It is only in the films, may be in his films, that a 20 percent stake holder can refrain so long from the corporate procedures and still retain her stake.
Not sure if these scenes (sans the violence in the island perpetrated by Gautam Nanda) are inspired from ‘Batman Begins’ but even otherwise it is worth emulating Christopher Nolan’s respect for proper depiction of business dealings. As a great admirer of Trivikram, I will have to admit that as the scale of Trivikram’s films goes big, his style of story telling seems to be relegated to the background.
Will be interesting to see if Trivikram attempts a Rajamouli and directs an upcoming hero or an unconventional hero, just to hone his craft.
This cribbing aside, Trivikram delivers a treat to PK fans. I am not very sure about the term “Pawanism” but if one were to define it on screen, this movie comes very close to it.
