Cast: Raja, Genelia, Suman, Hema, Sonu Sood, Brahmanandam, M.S.Narayana, Dharmavarapu, Suman Setty, Tannikella Bharani and Others
Director:Neelakanta
Producer:Bodduluri Rama Rao
Music:Chakri
Story and Screenplay:Neelakanta
Banner:Lifestyle Art Pictures
Release Date:26th January, 2008
Neelakantha has developed a style all his own, and his films come under the 'clean, family entertainment' bracket. Mister Medhavi has traces of his earlier movie, 'Sada Mee Sevalo', but just traces of it though. The plus points of the movie: humor, dialogues, characters. Minus points: pace, mediocre music, routine story.
Plot:
Viswak Sena is named, educated and brought up by his village primary school teacher (Tanikella Bharani) as he is orphaned at an early age. Swetha comes to his village from Canada as her grandmother is sick, and goes to the school for a while there. Viswak falls in love with her. They become friends but she soon goes back to Canada. After an MBA degree Viswak joins a company. He meets Swetha again as she is his employer's daughter. But Viswak is now a calculative person, who believes life runs on these very calculations. He plans to make Swetha fall in love with him, but fate seems to have other plans as Sidhartha comes into their lives.
Story, Screenplay and Direction:
The narrative is definitely interesting in the movie. It seems like a risk, a make or break thing. But it works for the movie. Neelakantha's movies have a real life touch to it, that's both realistic yet magical. He doesn't try anything different, which sometimes is a good thing. He's good with some aspects, like characters and narrative. A HR who's passion is theatre (MS Narayana wearing drama company greasepaint and Krishna costume-a riot), a 'Gandhian' who doesn't practice what he preaches (Brahmanandam) and Vishwak Sena himself. Reminds you of the late Jhandyala or even Bapu sometimes, as far as character portraitures are concerned.
The pace of each scene is deliberately slow, because real life is not a blur of fast moving objects. But with the average attention span decreased due to obvious reasons, it gets difficult to stay alert in some parts of the movie. Basically, the grip slackens. The songs are again a drag, except one.
A small chunk of the movie contains Raja speaking directly to the camera, and the childhood love story between Raja and Genelia. The office gossip and atmosphere is real. The various characters in the office, and even Sonu Sood's entry is good.
Performances:
Raja suits the character of Vishwak Sena, and he is expressive even as he is subtle. The energy level is down though, and surprisingly, even Genelia has downplayed her character for once. Funnily enough, the young Swetha has an accent while the grown-up Swetha has no trace of an accent. Suman as an entrepreneur shines in one scene where Sidhartha asks his employees to list out his bad qualities. Sonu Sood as Sidhartha, true to his name is slightly lofty yet likeable character and Sood does a convincing act. M.S.Narayana is really amusing as is Dharmavarapu. Tanikella Bharani justifies his role.
Music and Dance:
Boring songs, picturization including. The background is good in places.
Last Word:
The first half is good, the humor element is ever-present and its light entertainment throughout that has believable characters. The grip is lost somewhere in the second half and the movie drags there, but it all works out in the end. No go for the front-benchers. Watchable for the rest. |  |
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