ABHAY DEOL SHINES AS DEV

By Eye TV India Bureau

Critic's I-view

Anurag Kashyap isn't an ordinary director. He is non-traditional and non-conventional. He is rather contemporary. So is his movie titled 'Dev D' like his earlier films, say, 'Black Friday', 'Paanch' and 'No Smoking'. In spite of this, 'D Dev' looks like Bollywood's earlier avatars of Devdas, based on late Sarat Chandra's novel. There a major difference though between K. L Saigal, Dilip Kumar, Shah Rukh Khan and Abhay Deol as Devdas. While the first three movies were faithful to Sarat's legendary character, Anurag Kashyap's deviates from them in many ways.

Anurag's Devdas is just different inasmuch as his Devdas belongs to the present age though his hero also behaves like his earlier avatars in many respects. He also falls in love of childhood sweetheart Paro, then goes astray and moves close to Chandramukhi, after Paro marries with someone else consequent to an altercation between Dev and Paro. And, Paro's husband Bhuvan, is much older to her, and has two children. No sooner Dev loses Paro's love than he suffers from bouts of depression.

Dev falls in the lap of Chanda/Lenny (erstwhile Chandramukhi) who is a victim of society. Her fault is that someone sends her an SMS and she is therefore outcast by the family. Kashyap's movie too has the rich rural backdrop but that of the northern states of Punjab and Delhi. His hero completely disconnects with today's world. That's why he seeks from his childhood friend Paro played by Mahi Gill her nude pictures through e-mail! At the same time, he spurns her cycling to the neighboring fields at dawn with a mattress meticulously rolled up on the carrier for a secret meeting with him.

But he forgets that Paro isn't ready for any emotional exploitation in the name of love. As a result, the two move in different directions. While Paro moves on Dev falls a prey to alcohol and drug. Dev moves to a hotel in Delhi's famous Paharganj, drinks a lot and becomes unconscious and falls in young Chanda's lap This is Kashyap's Chandramukhi played by Kalki Koechlin. Again, this is not Sharat Chandra's character. As elsewhere Dev is son of a rich industrialist, who is sent away to London when he was 12, and returns to his hometown and to Paro (Mahi Gill), his childhood sweetheart.

Chandramukhi who loved Devdas from the core of her heart and had all the sympathy for a true lover of Paro, Anurag's Chanda is a modern girl. In fact, she is Lenny, the schoolgirl who ends up as the sex worker, for no fault of her. She is a dropout from her own family for being featured in a lewd MMS. Anurag has depicted Chanda as a true case of a girl being SMSed by a criminal. But, Chanda isn't a courtesan like Chandramukhi. His Lenny exclaims the feisty escort who attends college by day and plays Florence Nightingale by night and in shorts!

Less said about the relationship between Dev and Chanda is better. Dev stoops too low, but dreams of a second chance. He is found in a small joint in the crowded by-lanes of Paharganj, waiting for nirvana! Once again, there is a drastic deviation from Sarat's story. While Devdas looks towards Chanda in the absence of his first love Paro who leaves Dev alone, Anurag's Chanda is too strong to come close to Devdas for love alone.

While making the movie the director has applied the modern technique in all its aspects. His film is just different from others' Devdas in all aspects. His cinematography is different, editing wobbly and plot narration non-linear. Kashyap's characters are non-conventional and belong to the new stream cinema. His characters belong to the present age.Dev D played by Abhay Deol is a protagonist named Devender Singh Dhillon. He plays natural. So are his other lead players like Mahi and Kalki. Significantly, Abhay Deol in the guise of Dev performs excellently well. The movie's dialogues are very good. Amit Trivedi's music is good. "Emosanal Attyachaar" is already popular, besides "Nayan Tarse" and "Pardesi". Amitabh Bhattacharya's lyrics are equally good and made to Anurag's order. Anurag's story writing lacks consistency.

For more info:
http://ww.smashits.com/news/bollywood/movie-review/7089/dev-d.html

Charmme and Manjula in 'Kavya Diary'

MOVIE NAME: KAVYA’s DIARY
LANGUAGE: Telugu

STAR CAST: Charmi, Manjula, Shashank, Indrajith and ‘Satyam’ Rajesh
MUSIC COMPOSER: Manu Ramesan
PRODUCER: Sanjay Swaroop
DIRECTOR: VK Prakash
BANNER: Indira Productions Pvt. Ltd.

The audio of Kavya's Diary produced by Sanjay Swaroop under the banner of Indira Productions Pvt Ltd. with Charmi, Manjula, Sashank and Indrajit in the lead was launched in Hyderabad on Sunday through Aditya Music
. Karuna Prakash and Manu Ramesan are making their debuts as director and music director through the flick.

At a function held at Prasad Labs, Super Star Krishna unveiled the audio CDs and handed over the first piece to young sensation Ramcharan Teja.

Speaking on the occasion Krishna said, "The couple
, Sanjay and Manjula have brought out the film with a commitment. We are sure that the audio as well as film would be a big hit." Ramcharan Teja said, 'It appears that the film has not been made in a commercial way but in a realistic manner. All the songs are quite melodious and different from routine ones."

Senior director cum producer Tammareddy Bharadwaja remarked, "Manjula has produced films like Show and Pokiri and bagged awards with the first and rewards with the second film. We are very happy to learn that she is bringing out one more film."

Director of the film Karuna Prakash said, 'I moulded the film according to my perspective. It is a family thriller and we are sure that the audiences will experience a good feel while watching the film."

Baby Suhanitak, Leena Siddhu, Rajesh, Bharat Reddy, Rakesh and others are in the cast. Dialogues are by Vakkantam Vamsi, camera is by Shyam Dutt, lyrics are by Ananta Sriram and Ramajogaiah Sastry, while editing is by Mahesh Narayana.

More Details: http://www.rooju.com/kavyas-dairy-audio-video-and-trailers/

Konchem Istam Kochem Kastam updates

Konchem Istam Kochem Kastam starring Siddarth and Tamanna is a family entertaining movie. Being a family subject the story mainly revolves around Siddarth, Tamanna,Prakash Raj- playing Siddu’s father,Ramya Krishna- playing Siddu’s mother & Nazar- playing Tamanna’s father.Fifty percent of the shooting has been completed successfully. A rain song is being canned at Saradhi Studios on Siddarth, Tamanna and other dancers. The next schedule is most likely to be in Ramoji Film City.

Kishore Pardhasani alias Dolly is Directing this film .Successful producer Nallamalupu Bujji is producing this film under his banner Lakshmi Narasimha Productions. Apparently Bujji is planning the audio function with live concert of the music directors of the film Shankar, Ehsaan and Loy in the coming December and the film will be a 2009 Sankranti Gift to the Telugu audience. It’s needless to mention cinematographer Vijay Chakravarthy’s camera work, as it has already been noted in the block buster Bommarillu. Comedy emperors Brahmanandam and Venu Madhav are among the prominent cast who are going to make the audience burst out laughter.

For more Details and Photo Gallery visit: http://www.southdreamz.com/2008/10/konchem-istam-kochem-kastam-updates/

Nachavule - Different teenage love story

Ushakiron Movies is known for bringing excellent subjects on the screen. Producer Ramoji Rao had touched several aspects in producing the films including action, family and message-oriented subjects, besides some love stories. Likewise, Ravibabu is known for directing novel subjects. He had his own typical style of moulding the scenes, with a different taking and special treatment. Instead of keeping a separate comedy track, he makes the audiences to laugh instantaneously by creating certain scenes and typical situations. The combination of this successful producer and director brought out a different love story on the screen, which came the 81st film on Ushakiron Movies' banner. As the story demanded, the director chose all new faces for the film.

Lava Kumar is the son of a middle-class man. His birth itself is a speciality his father hails from north Andhra while his mother is from north India. Lav's father always grumbles for everything. He is quite strict and appears very impatient. However, his mother is very kind and gentle. Once Lav's father gets a verbal thrashing for his son's act and he stops talking with Lav from then onwards. Lav gets a brother when he was eight-year-old. The latter has a penchant to steal small articles and sell it away for chocolates and ice creams. Lav grows up and completes his Intermediate.

Like many teenage boys Lav also wants to move with girl friends and he makes trials from 9 am to 7 pm but could not catch the eye of any girl. He then decides not to follow many girls and instead concentrate on one girl. With the help of his friend Sreenu, he manages to get in touch with a girl called Anu. Though Anu does not care Lav in the beginning, he helps her by saving her father when he suffers a stroke. After getting acquaintance, he pleads with her to be his girl friend. On condition that Lav should not touch, embrace or kiss her, she agrees to be his girl friend for just 10 days. Being a disciplined girl, Anu invites Lav to her house, only to let her father know where she is going and with whom. However, Lav is quite innocent and his idea is only to show others that he too had a girlfriend. This innocence makes Anu herself to cross the limits and breaks the conditions.

On one occasion, Lav shoots Anu with his mobile phone when she was angry and accidentally, Anu kisses him and he shoots it with his mobile unknowingly. She changes his style and makes him very attractive. So every girl starts liking Lav and he continues to date with everyone and move freely. Incidentally, Anu falls in love with Lav, but the latter has no such idea. After the purpose is served, Lav starts ignoring Anu. Lav's brother steals the mobile and sells it off to a mobile shop. Noticing the kissing scene in the mobile, the shop owner passes it to his friend's mobile through MMS. Like this, all the mobiles which have the MMS facility gets the video. This embarrasses Anu and her father. The same video boomerangs and all the girls who moved freely with Lav start refusing him.

At this juncture, Lav's mother falls sick. Then Lav's father realises his folly and changes his attitude. However, she dies of illness. Lav starts repenting but it is of no use. When Anu and her father decide to leave the city. A youth, who is after Anu for quite sometime, bores grudge against Lav and stabs him. He also threatens to kill Anu. Lav wants to save her despite he is nearing to death. Anu believes that Lav is playing a prank but notices someone stabbing him and realises how sincerely he loved her. The film ends on a happy note with the union of Lav and Anu.

PLUS: The entire first half of the film was devoted to portray the feelings of teenage youth, their interest towards girls and the pranks they play to capture the attention of girls, the enjoyment of moving with a girlfriend and other such things. Ravibabu gave excellent situational comedy all through the first half and the one-liners evoked tremendous response and laugh from the audiences. The second half, however, was completely devoted to serious love, family drama and sentiment and turns out to be a complete Ushakiron Movies genre film. The hero, heroine and the villain, hero's parents, heroine's father and a man in the neighbourhood of the heroine — every character lived to the expectations of the audiences. Action by Kanal Kannan is simple and the camera work by Sudhakar Reddy is okay. Music by Sekhar Chandra is good in parts.

MINUS: Though the director tried to portray the feelings of the teenage boy, he ignored how he could manage the girls, maintaining a mobile phone and bike, moving to costly pubs and coffee shops. Though in a couple of scenes, the hero is seen taking money from the heroine, it failed to establish the financial support for the hero, as his father always used to grumble against him. Likewise, it was not shown what the boy's brother is doing with the money by selling the stolen articles. How anyone could purchase stolen articles from a child instead of complaining it to his parents. Several scenes have no logic and the director conveniently ignored them as he concentrated on portraying a different love story.

REMARKS: The segregation of the film for a complete entertainment in the first half and complete serious scenes in the second half made the film losing balance. The first song in black and white and the title song were choreographed excellently. One could justify that the price of the ticket could be given to the first half and to the canning of these two songs. As a whole, it is a complete Ravibabu's film in the first half and the Ushakiron Movies' film in the second half.

Cast: All new faces

Credits: Storyline – Satyanand, Action – Kanal Kannan, Art – Narayana Reddy, Lyrics – Bhaskarabhatla, Choreography – Nixon, Editing – Marthand K Venkatesh, Director of Photography – N Sudhakar Reddy, Music – Sekhar Chandra, Producer – Ramoji Rao, Script, screenplay, dialogues and direction – Ravibabu

Banner: Ushakiron Movies

Released on: December 19, 2008

Get other details at: http://entertainment.oneindia.in/telugu/reviews/2008/nachavule-review-201208.html