Bro - Movie Review

Power star Pawan Kalyan teamed up with Saidharam Tej for the remake of Tamil film "Vinodaya Sitham", in the direction of Samutrakani, who directed the original. Trivikram pennes the dialogues and wrote screenplay. Sai Tej is on a high after the success of Virupaksha and Pawan gave 2 hits with remakes - Vakeel Saab and Bheemla Nayak. 

Story :- Markandeyulu/Mark (Sai Tej) leads life as a machine without having time for anything, family, love, colleagues etc., stating he doesn't have time. His responsibilities, his ambition are the things that drive him. All of a sudden, he meets with car accident and dies. Before going to heaven, he meets "Time God' (Pawan Kalyan). Mark requests to give him another chance to fulfill all his duties on earth. Time allows him 90 days to lead life again. What does Mark do in those 90 days? Was he able to survive the inevitable? Forms rest of the story.

Performances :-  Sai Tej did an okay job. His acting in majority of the scenes looked artificial and unnatural. He did well in few emotional scenes. All the character artists had very minimal roles and they were fine, be it Ketika, Priya Warrier, Rohini, Vennela Kishore, Tanikella Bharani, etc., Bro is an out and out Pawan Kalyan movie. Not sure if it was a guest character in original, but here he is there for 90% of the film. Time character is funny, quirky, at the same time preaching. There are no limits for the characterization as it's Time God and director & writer used it to the maximum. PSPK was terrific in the nostalgic references of his old songs. He conveys the essence of life in lighter vein pretty well. 

Technicians :-  The basic plot of the story is pretty serious and important. If it's conveyed in serious tone, it would be complete preaching and nobody would turn up to theatres. If it's completely diluted and made completely as an commercial film, the basic essence of it's gone. Both these elements has to be blended perfectly to make it a good recipe. The writer and director have succeeded 50% in doing so. To satisfy the fans of PSPK, they covered old songs of his film every now and then. Gave divine look wherever wanted, some one liners here and there. However, they should have given some more time initially for the emotions between various characters with Tej are well established. Also, the struggles and ideology of Tej should have been well conveyed. Due to half cooked emotions here, we don't connect well with them in the fag end of the film. Dialogues were decent, if not good. Costumes of PSPK was very good. VFX are decent. Songs and background score was nice. 

Positives :-

Pawan Kalyan

Old movie songs of PSPK

Crisp runtime

Dialogues

Negatives :-

Lack of emotional depth

Dilution of core plot

Summary :-  Bro could have been great had there was more emotional depth. It ended up as a commercial version of Aa Naluguru, with an extended time of 90 days life. 

Rating :- 2.5/5 (Feast for fans and average one time watch for normal audience)

Oppenheimer - Movie Review

Christopher Nolan, the master storyteller, who blends science and drama to the highest level, has come up with the bipoic of father of atom bomb "Robert Oppenheimer". He chose brilliant actor Cillian Murphy to play the lead. Though Cillian has been part of Nolan's movies before, they were either supporting characters or cameo, but not as a lead. 

Story :- The movie starts at a time with 4 narrations. AEC hearing of Oppenheimer (Cillian) to revoke his security clearance, Senate questioning the links between Oppenheimer and Lewis Stauss (Robert Downey Jr.), Oppenheimer's initial days as a student, Strauss and Oppenheimer's interactions. Nolan preferred such kind of screenplay, to generate interest in an otherwise normal drama. It would take around 10 minutes to settle down and understand this. The entire story revolves around how Oppenheimer along with his team at Los Alamos built and tested atom bomb, what we're the hurdles, how it is used and what was the aftermath, politics surrounding him, egos of the scientists, spies within the team, his personal life, his stand on war and usage of bombs, his fight to prove his loyalty etc.

Performances :- All the actors lived their characters. However, Robert Downey Jr and Cillian Murphy stole the limelight with their top notch performances. This is kind of revelation for Robert, with subtle yet effective portrayal. His character needs to be looked composed though it has lot of other emotions inside, he just nailed it. Matt Damon as Leslie Groves had a decent supporting character, which he handled well. Casey Affleck did a small cameo. Rami Malek also did a cameo, which turned out to be the turning point in the entire plot, which is revealed during the climax. The Einstein character was a perfect replica of what we would have seen in the photos till date. Florence pugh as Oppenheimer's love interest also had a peculiar character and she was apt. Emily Blunt as Mrs. Oppenheimer also had good scope to show lot of emotions and she is pretty good. When Oppenheimer is down or confused, she motivates him. Cillian was fabulous, to say the least. This film should be able to bag him and Robert an Oscar. As an enthusiastic student, a visionary scientist, a goral oriented leader, a partial communist, a guilty atomic bomb creator, he had many shades and lot of struggle within, which he emoted really well. 

Technicians :- Sound designing of the film is terrific. The scene where Oppenheimer gives speech after the atomic bomb test was prime example, capturing the foot tapping and silence in his brain at at time. Current story was narrated in black & white and past versions in colour. Cinematography, colour tone and costumes were perfectly maintained for the mood. Unlike Inception, Interstellar, Tenet, in this move Nolan didn't bring complicated science theories into execution and confused us. Being a biopic, he stuck to the narration from 2 individuals perspective. He extracted fabulous performances from all the characters. The atomic bomb testing scene was of utter brilliance perfectly setting up the premise, with excellent visuals and sound, natural reactions. He didn't go for cinematic high moments, but just kept it natural and original. This is not an action adventure or political drama, it's a complete dialogue based drama. 

Positives :-

Engaging screenplay 

Solid performances

Great sound designing

Negatives :-

Not a nolan-esque science adventure

No cinematic high moments

Could be termed slow, dull

Summary :- Worth a watch for brilliant performances and screenplay. It's drama at its best. You just have to be patient enough.

Rating :- 3.5/5