Nara Rohit's BANAM (2009) Movie Review

Film: Baanam

Rating: 3/5

Banner: Three Angels Studio

Cast: Nara Rohit, Vedhika, Sayaji Shinde, Ranadheer, Rajeev Kanakala, Bhanuchander, AVS, Sivanarayana, Ragini, Giridhar etc

Music: Mani Sharma

PRO: BA Raju

Cinematography: Anil Bandari

Director: Chaitanya Dantuluri

Producer: Seshu Priyanka

Release date: 16th Sep 2009

The movie raises curtain for Nara Rohit, the new actor from political family. As the title sounds, it’s a serious flick and let us see how far the expectations were met.


Story:

Bhagat Panigrahi (Nara Rohi) is an IPS aspirant who happens to the son of an ex-naxalite Sekhar Panigrahi (Sayaji Shinde). Subba Lakshmi (Vedika) is a Brahmin girl who gets betrayed by husband and in laws and also loses her father. Bhagat rescues her from a Railway Station and takes her to his house.

On the other hand Shakti Patnaik (Ranadheera), an anti social element holds entire system in his control and rules as per his whims and fancies in a place called Ranasthali. An incident drives Bhagat on Shakti and thus he develops turbulence with him.

Finally who wins on whom is not a question! But how one wins on other? That forms the subject.


Performances:

Nara Rohit: His character goes in underplaying mode. He looked good on screen with sharp features but limited his performance with just 2-3 expressions on a whole. He seems to have got fixed up in rigidity in some scenes. He needs to develop ease in face and body to rock ahead as commercial hero. His voice is sounding good with huge base tone.

Vedika: She has perfectly grooved in the role of a Brahmin girl and acted as per the requirement without over acting or under playing.

Sayaji Shinde is ok as naxalite while Bhanu Chander and Rajeev Kanakala are perfect as police cops. Ranadheer of ‘Happy Days’ and ‘Yuvatha’ fame has played well as antagonist. He looked like JD Chakravarthy in some angles.

Technically the movie is sound and especially music, songs, cinematography and editing worked well.


Director has shown enough flair in showing symbolisms. Some mentionable scenes those depict the caliber of director:

* Showing the photos of Bhagat Singh and Che Guevara parallel to father and son respectively, to denote their ideologies
* Jasmines in the plait of heroine losing color to denote that she sat at the same place whole day in Railway Station
* Showing Sri Sri’s ‘Mahaprasthanam’ in hero’s hands when he revolts on anti social elements for the first time
* Showing Rs 2/- currency note in the hand of Sayaji Shinde to demonstrate the atmosphere of 1989
* Geetanjali movie running in a theatre, again to depict that was 1989
* Showing the ship named ‘Shikari’ when the villain shoots a character and kills
* Hero holding ‘sutthi and kodavali’ in climax fight to portray his ideology (as the villain holds ‘trisoolam’ in his hand, it can be understood as fight between theism and atheism)!

All the above scenes say that director has some mettle in him. At the same time the director has missed the opportunity to portray 1989 atmosphere on screen in better way with Art Department. Budget might have become a hindrance to it; otherwise it would have become something bigger than Tamil movie ‘Subramaniapuram’, brought into Telugu as Anantapuram. Other than showing Ambassador Cars, wall posters and red capped police constables, nothing else was shown that pumps in nostalgic feel.

Highlights:
Music
Songs
Dialogues
Story line

Disappointments:
Lack of required humor


Analysis:

The movie is serious but sensible. The debut venture of Chaitanya Dantuluri as director is commendable. Nara Rohit also has shown good screen presence although he needs to shine himself with respect to performance and demonstrating histrionics. The limitation in the movie is lack of comedy. The plus point in this is subtle dialogue by Gandham Nagaraju of ‘Gamyam’ fame. Other added glitters are background score by Mani Sharma, beautiful songs and cinematography.

First half of the movie runs serious but promises something interesting in second half. But the second half also runs in similar tempo without any twists or turns. The narration is very well within the limits of audience’s thought periphery but not out of the box.

On a whole, the movie definitely appeals for class audiences but it should go with aggressive publicity to reach masses.

Bottom Line: Worth Watch for a serious treat