Chintakayala Ravi Movie Review

Film: Chintakayala Ravi
Rating: 3/5
Cast: Venkatesh, Anushka, Mamatha Mohandas, Sunil, Ali, Brahmanandam, Venu Madhav, Lakshmi, Chandra Mohan, Venu and Jr NTR as guests, Arthi Chabria etc
Art: Chinna
Editing: Srikar Prasad
Story, Dialogues: Kona Venkat
Screenplay, Direction: Yogesh
Producer: Nallamalupu Bujji
Released On: 2nd October 2008

There are no movies from big four stars these days. And Venkatesh's 'Chintakayala Ravi' grabbed the attention of many because of that. Let us see how the film tuned with the expectations.

The movie starts with the voice over of Prakash Raj that introduces the characters and characterizations.

Story

Chintakayala Ravi (Venkatesh) is an age bar guy who lands in USA and works in a bar as waiter. But he bluffs his parents (Lakshmi and Chandramohan) those live in his native village saying that he is working as a software engineer. Ravi's mother looks out for a bride and finds Mamidikayala Lavanya (Mamatha Mohandas), the daughter of a strict landlord (Shinde). Lavanya agrees to marry Ravi learning that he is SW engineer. But Ravi develops strife with Sunitha (Anushka), a girl in USA who happens to be Lavanya's friend. She reveals the secret of Ravi to Lavanya saying that he is a waiter in bar but not SW engineer. The engagement between Lavanya and Ravi gets cancelled with that. How things settle down at the end forms the rest of the story.

Performances

Venkatesh's screen presence is good and his energy levels have to save the movie on a whole. But he has to take care while acting in some nasty scenes in the name of comedy.

There is no big scope for Anushka and Mamatha Mohandas to give out performance and they are just ok in their roles.

Lakshmi continued her over active sentimental performance that she delivered in Murari.

Sunil's comedy is boring and bears no new energy. Master Bharat appears in a few scenes but his part is very limited to bring sufficient laughs in theaters.

Ali's Nachmi comedy is continued from 'Chirutha' which is not appealing.

Brahmanandam and Venu Madhav also failed to bring right kind of laughs.

The main reason for all this is weak script. It appears that the dialogues are written in hurry without considering the punch aspect.

Ajay's character is pale and the growing artiste of his caliber need not have done such unimportant role.

Coming to technical aspects, the lip sink of Anushka is missing in her introduction scene. Cinematography is good but still would have been better. Music is not haunting though a couple of songs are good at beat.

Direction falls below the average line. Director would have taken care of screenplay and also would have considered the importance of scenes he made. Production values are good as the film was made in USA but how far that is required for the story and narration of this standard has to be noted.

Analysis

It's an attempt to make it a right mix of mass and class elements but end up as an oddly flavored concoction.

Many scenes were blatantly lifted from Hindi film 'Hum Tum' in second half. And the most popular 'Om Shanti Om' BGM is also used many times.

The popularly forwarded 'Kitikeelu 2008' (the terms of Windows 2008 translated in Telugu) is used as a comedy scene in this film but that turned pale with no laughs.

And Venkatesh's scene of copying in exams is lifted from Mr Bean comedy. Originality is missing in large part of the movie.

The first half was dealt with some lighter moments and second half turned heavy with easily guessed climax and routine dialogues without any punch or energy.

The movie runs only on the energy levels of Venkatesh. It is true that audiences could watch the movie with interest only because of Venkatesh. But is he projecting himself in right sense with the characters he is doing in recent times? That sits as a big question in many heads. It is known that Venkatesh is known for sentimental films and piteous climax scenes right from films like 'Raja'. Adding to that these days he seems to have building up his trade mark by nasty comedy. The nauseate comedy that was scene in Adavari Matalaku Ardhale Verule (sitting to shit etc) is followed here as well. That would certainly keep a large set of audiences especially families in inconvenience. The first day audiences among masses also expressed their disgust for seeing their favorite star acting in such rotten scenes. And another aspect is Venkatesh has continued his trade mark 'pant-less scene' that was started way back since 'Preminchukundam Raa'.

On a whole, it's a movie that has to stand at the AP box office due to long weekend as there are not other big star movies in vie. But as per the material, the movie is beneath the expectations.