Love Story - Movie Review

After scoring blockbuster with Fidaa, Shekar Kammula is coming with Love Story. This is the 1st combo of Naga Chaitanya and Sai Pallavi. They were supposed to be in Premam, but Sai Pallavi didn't want to do remake films, even though it would be recreating her character of "Malar Miss" from Premam original version in Malayalam. The same character was later offered to Shruti Hassan. 

Story :-

A selfmade zumba master who comes from downtrodden family and lower caste dreams of opening his own centre. A girl comes from her village to city, to get a job, stand on her own legs and take care of her family, instead of begging her own uncle for livelihood. Despite being from an upper caste, she has a dark past which disturbs her very often. How these 2 meet, fall in love, move ahead in life chasing their dreams and breaking the socio economic barriers forms the story. 

Performances :-

Sai Pallavi just killed it. You can't take eyes off her, be it the dance, emotions, anger, love, pain, she is just too good. Especially in the emotional scenes, you tend to feel her pain. Her dance moves were extraordinary. She's the best dancer I've ever seen on Indian screen till date. This is Naga Chaitanya's career best performance till date. His body language, dialogue delivery in Telangana slang, hai expressions were on par with Sai Pallavi. Though he is not a great dancer and knowing Sai Pallavi is a pro, he improved a lot and gave his best. Rajeev Kanakala as uncle is terrific and menacing. Uttej, Eswari Rao, Devayani were good in their roles. 

Technicians :-

Music is one of the biggest asset of the movie. Audie was a big hit long before it's release and the background score was also apt. Costume designing was very natural and neat. Cinematography was good. Unnecessary graphics of old city area should have been avoided, as it was clearly evident and made it look cheap. Picturization and placement of songs was good. Shekar Kammula dialogues were simple, real and striking. Direction was very well done, involving us in the story from first and makes us connect with lead pair. 2 serious and delicate social problems were addressed through a love story, which was very effectively done and it's not an easy job to do. 100% marks for that. Editing could have been crispier, as some parts felt boring. 

Positives :-

Sai Pallavi & Naga Chaitanya

Music

Basic plot and it's narration

Negatives :-

Slow pace

Editing and run time

Hurried climax 

Analysis :-

Love Story is an intense and emotional story with a strong message. Well perceived and is worth watching. 

Rating - 3/5

Navarasa (Web series) - Review

Mani Ratnam produced this web series which has 9 different stories, each representing one emotion of our "Navarasa".

1) Karuna - A revenge seeking brother kills his target, but he couldn't handle the guilt. He seeks Forgiveness (Karuna). Will he get it or not? Some of the finest actors like Prakash Raj, Revathy, Vijay Sethupathi were wasted in this story. No match to their talent nor it's engaging enough. 2/5

2) Hasya - A school drop out kids who grows up to become a comedian in films, comes back to his childhood school as chief guest and recollects old memories. Most boring episode of the series. Yogi is purely Unutilized. 0/5

3) Adbhuta - A scientist calls his friend to home and explains how dangerous his new invention is and how he lost everything due to it. He asks his friend to ask govt to stop his assistant who already knew a lot about his invention. This episode is the best of the lot. It's a thriller and worth watching. Arvind Swamy and Prasanna were very good, but Director Karthick Naren is stupendous. 4/5

4) Bheebatsa - A jeolous elder brother can't see the happiness in his younger brothers family. He reluctantly attends marriage of his brother and disrupts the preparations. Felt the title is not apt. Story wise it's not great nor it was interesting. But acting wise Delhi Ganesh was too natural and believable as usual. 2.5/5

5) Shanthih - Set at the border of a village where LTTE and Sri Lankan army have set their posts on both sides, one terrorist tries to save a young boy's younger brother by going inside the village. Was he able to save? Bobby Simha did good job as the terrorist, Gautam Menon as their leader made his presence felt. This is also kind of okay story. 2.5/5

6) Raudra - A single mother suffers a lot in  bringing up a son and a daughter by doing household chores. The son pressurises his mother to take debt to get his football shoes so that he can play for his team. She somehow manages to get the money and the son wish comes true. What happens next is Violence. This is second best episode of the series. Arvind Swamy as director also shines with it. Terrific screenplay. A R Rahman background score and Santosh Shivan cinematography takes the narration to next level. 4/5

7) Bhayaanaka - A dark past of a woman finds where she is and knocks her door. Initially though she couldn't identify, by the time she comes to know about it, she cannot escape from it. This story is also well written and well acted. Siddarth & Parvathy were aptly cast and they did good job. Background score of Vishal Bharadwaj needs special mention. 3.5/5

8) Veera - After a shootout between naxalites and police, a naxalite leader gets injured and is caught by police. Taking him to headquarters was the responsibility of a newly joined policeman. Was he able to deliver it? Atharvaa and Kishore were fine in their role, in this not so gripping tale. May be Vijay Sethupathi would have been a better choice for Naxalite role. 2.5/5

9) Srinagara - Love at first sight happens between a music director/singer and lady singer. How they express their love, how they blush, how they enjoy each other's company and where are they headed forms the story! This is my personal favorite. A typical Gautam Vasudev Menon love story, with soulful music, mind blowing chemistry and what not. Suriya was too good, as usual. But you just can't take eyes off Prayaga Martin. She's gorgeous. You have to give major part of the credit to PC Sreeram for his lens. He was phenomenal. Karthik's music is a big asset for it. All songs were outstanding, especially when Raja Sir tunes make way in between. 4/5