SUNDARAKANDA 2008

Banner: Chaitra Cinema Circuit
Released on: February 8, 2008

Cast:
Charmy
Allari Naresh
Prema, Sunil Sharma
Ranganath
Sangeetha
Kota Srinivas Rao and others.
Credits:
Story and dialogues - Mullapudi Venkata Ramana
Cinematography - PRK Raju
Editing - Srikara Prasad
Lyrics - Mullapudi, Veturi, Jonnavittula
Music - Vidyasagar
Presents - Petrofab International, UAE,

Co-producer - Tummala Bhanuprakash Reddy
Producer - K Aparna
Screenplay and direction - Bapu
Bapu who is considered one of the most versatile directors of Tollywood cinema made some memorable movies and classics in the past, but his recent offerings bring some blemishes to his movie careers. SUNDARAKANDA is also no exception from this. No one can associate with this old fashioned movie that is narrated and shown in a slow pace. In todays worked where movie buffers are very eager to see some thing new & different, get disappointed by this film’s presentations.
Story:
Pinky (Charmi) is the daughter of Sita (Prema), who keeps away from her husband. When Pinky insists on why she does so, Sita tells her reason. Sita fells in love with Raja Ravivarma (Sunil Sharma), son of a Zamindar Surendra Varma (Ranganath). Ravivarma and Sita meet each other at a study tour and fell in love. They married there in a tribal village. But Surendra Varma's father had different plans. He wanted to get Ravivarma married to his niece - daughter of his brother-in-law Bhushanam (Vizag Prasad).
His sons marriage with Sita gave Surendra Varma gets the shock of his life and she lost both his legs that day. Surendra Varma's wife Bharati (Sangeetha) pleaded with Sita to save her family by forgetting about the love that she had for her son. After Sita did so, Bhushanam makes a noise and starts a rumour that Sita escaped with the gold ornaments from the palace.
Now Pinky attempts to reunite her mother and father. She reveals to the Surendra Varma's family that she was the daughter of Ravi Varma. Since Ravi Varma is an aspirant for the Chief Minister's post, their family secret being exposed could be danger for his hopes of becoming CM.
So, the family allows Pinky to stay with them. Pinky, a chivalrous girl, gets along with everyone. She starts playing pranks with her father's opponent Kota (Kota Srinivasa Rao) who is also an aspiring candidate for the Chief Minister post. With the help of a journalist (Naresh), she brings out the truth about of Kota. In the climax, everyone tries to make Ravi Varma the chief Minsister but he turns it down and reunites with Sita and Pinky.
The writer tried to modernise the original 'Sundarakanda' in Ramayana. The role played by Lord Hanuman in uniting Rama and Sita, was rewritten in such a way that a girl took the responsibility in uniting her parents who were separated. In Sundarakanda, Lord Hanuman teaches a lesson to Ravana in his bid to unite the Rama and Sita. This was equated with teaching a lesson to a political opponent of the heroine's father. This is where the writer fumbled and could not correlate the story well. As a whole, despite the fantastic directorial capability of Bapu, the film failed to satiate the urge of the Telugu film lovers, who go to the film with high expectations.