Fidaa
Shekhar Kammula has a penchant for good story-telling. It is a widely accepted fact in the Telugu movie industry. But as with every movie so far, one or the other in his choice of cast fails to live up to the mark, to match his kind of story telling.
Shekhar put together a good story centered around affection in a family and the strong willed nature of a modern Indian girl in rural Telangana. There are some directorial mistakes like most directors but overall he does a good job keeping the viewers engaged.
Sai Pallavi excels in her debut Telugu role. It takes a lot of dedication from an actor to learn a new language & dub for themselves instead of taking the easy route. The only thing that could outdo her impressive dubbing work was her acting. She nailed every nuance of every expression required of her throughout the movie. The director chose to use virtually no make-up for her but some light brush-up would not have hurt. Being a doctor and an actor, that is a rare breed. Her dancing was just as beautiful as everything else she did on screen. It won’t be a surprise if Rajamouli casts her soon in a role needing a commanding performance from an actress.
Varun Tej in his 5th film still needs to improve a lot. There were a lot of expectations from him and he did not quite live up to them. His performance is “satisfactory”. First he needs to get a stylist who knows how to not make him look weird with the wrong hairstyles that do not suit him. He looked like, for lack of a better word, a porcupine for most of the movie. There are some who can carry longer hair with spikes. Varun is not one of them. He also needs to workout and stay more fit. One can easily tell that he is piling on the pounds. For his height, if he is not too careful, his acting career will end up like his father’s — unfulfilled potential wasted. Along with staying in shape he needs to improve his expressions in many situations. He is only good on screen when smiling and uncomfortable in most other situations on screen. Another thing I noticed with him in most of his few movies so far is that his dubbing is out of sync with his lip movement many times. Not sure why that happens with him even with different directors but if I had to guess — it probably has to do with his inability to do a scene well enough to match the actual dialogues.
The rest of the cast do a decent job and make it worth a watch at the movies. A feisty girl defining the path her life must take in rural India should be inspiring to many young women. Well done Shekhar Kammula.
SPOILERS BELOW
Some of the mistakes Shekhar made:
- When Varun drinks tea/coffee in Banswada on a morning, you can clearly tell it is empty, especially with so much movement and zero spill
- When Varun & Bhanumati are driving in his red mustang, his black Infiniti is following behind
- When Varun & Bhanumati are in his car in another scene, you can clearly tell there is a police escort behind keeping the traffic at bay
- Snow does not pound on a building like rain. There is no sound when snow falls
- Raju & Renuka are told the good news about going to have a baby. They celebrate and barely 5 seconds later Raju goes away to get their vehicle. That is very artificial. Should have had a separate scene to allow Renuka and Varun to discuss Bhanumati.
