Meena Starring VENGAMAMBA (2009) Telugu Movie Review

Film: VENGAMAMBA

Rating: 3/5

Banner: V M C Films

Cast: Meena, Sarath Babu, Saikiran, Sana, Subbaraya Sarma, Ashok Rao, Ananth, Sudha, Sivaparvathy, Ranganath, Sriram and others

Music: M M Keeravani

Cinematography: P R K Raju

Director: Uday Bhaskar

Producer: Doraiswamy Raju

Release Date: July 17, 2009

Story:

A holy tale, the story begins on the backdrop of Tarigonda with the life of Vengamamba (meena) who is the darling daughter of Krishnaiah (sarath Babu) and Mangamamba (sudha). However, their dreams of seeing their daughter married does not help as right from childhood, she is into the trance of lord Venkateswara (sai kiran). She gets married to Venkata Chalapathy of Injeti family. However, he dies due to a snake bite. From then on, Vengamamba gets into a complete service to the god and begins to write songs and various poems on the lord. She has her own form of obstructions in the form of Kainkaryam (ananth), Dikshitulu (ashok rao) but then divine help is always there to assist her pious heart. A chance sequence takes her to Tirumala and what happens from there forms the rest of the story.

Presentation:

The director has come up with a neat storyline and both the presentation and narrative were good. The dialogues were simple, the script was written without much flaws and the screenplay was sensible. Music played a key role and it did well while cinematography was neat. Graphics were excellent. The make up department could have been better since the puffing up was a bit on the higher side. Also, the art department should have brought more authentic feel to it. Editing was crisp. Costumes were apt. meena did a fabulous job and showed enough maturity in her role. Saikiran and Sana were the perfect choices. Saikiran has shown good potential, Sarath Babu was elegant, Subbaraya Sarma was impressive, Ananth was good, L B Sriram was okay. The others did their bit and contributed.

Conclusion:

The film has been a take on the real life story of the famous Vengamamba of Tarigonda. The makers have taken an authentic touch to it and while the first half revolves around her childhood to her younger days, the second half goes about with her divine journey and spiritual awareness. The film has got some real good technical effects and with some decent performances by the cast, it was neat. The film will surely appeal to the family audience and those who are interested in divine flicks. Maybe few learning points for the youth and the mass audience as well. This will be a decent run at the box office with some positive word of mouth.

Bharatstudent Verdict : Divine and neat, recommended

MEENA

Meena Durairaj ( is one of the most successful actresses in South Indian cinema. Meena was born on September 16, 1974, in Chennai, India. Her mother Raja Mallika who is a politician belonging to Congress Party is also a former actress. She became heroine in a very young age when she was studying 8th std, she was just 12 or 13yrs old. But the characters she made is really a matured one, though the 'cute' and 'sweet little girl' performed very well in all her characters. This made her most successful heroine and she is well known for her 'beautiful eyes', 'charming smile' and 'sweet baby voice'.
Meena started her career as a the child artist in Tamil films. She acted with Harikrishna and Kamal Haasan, and later became a the star in her own right. She had hits with Muthu, Ejaman, Veera and Avvai Shanmughi. Following the release of her movies with Rajinikanth in Japan and their commercial success, Meena's popularity also rose in Japan. She has acted in almost all the south Indian languages like Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada etc and opposite almost all the leading actors in these languages. Her first film as a child artist was 'Nenjangal' with Sivaji Ganesan. She was in the film industry as the top heroine in Telugu and Tamil for almost one and a half decades successfully from the early 1990s. She often portrayed characters with unidimensional personality with no negativity and shades of grey. She was also known to be limited as a glamorous actress though she acted in a few glamourous roles like Maaman magal in Tamil opposite Sathyaraj and Muta Mestri in Telugu opposite Chiranjeevi. She has also acted in Malayalam movies. In the Kannada remake of Autograph, she played Sneha's role of Divya. She is currently starring as the lead in the Sun TV serial Lakshmi.She did her schooling till 8th std in Vidyodhya schools in Chennai, after that she underwent private coaching and completed her 10th std . Then she got her MA (Geography)degree from University of Madras through open university system. Currently she is acting in one Tamil serial.Her close friends are actresses Maheswari, Ramba, Sanghavi and Roja. Roja and Meena, in their younger age, resembled each other so much. In fact Meena has acted as Roja's younger sister at least in 5 or 6 movies in Telugu. Even in peak of their competition when they acted together, Roja & Meena have been thick friends. When the make up artist failed to turn up at a remote village in Kakinada during the movie shoot of "Bobbili Simham" in 1994, its known that Roja did Meena's hairstyles for those two days for a song involving Meena and much appreciated by Meena herself.official website of Meena - Says her date of birth September 16, 1979.(!). Meena acted as a married women in a 1990 DD TV Serial (Anbulla Amma) with famous Tamil Actress Manorama. She is not definitely 11 years old if anybody could recollect the serial or her first movie she acted as Herione in 1990.Filmography

Actress:

1. Katha Parayumpol (2007) .... Sridevi
2. Black Cat (2007)
3. Karutha Pakshikal (2006)
4. Chandrolsavam (2005) .... Indulekha
5. Udayananu Tharam (2005) .... Madhumathi
6. Natturajavu (2004) .... Maya
7. Shock (2004) .... Malini
8. Simhachalam (2003)
9. Mr. Brahmachari (2003) .... Ganga
10. Villain (2003) .... Thangam
11. Citizen (2001) .... Citizen's Mother
12. Sri Manjunatha (2001) .... Goddess Parvathi
13. Censor (2001)
14. Devi Durga Shakti (2001) .... Rajeshwari/Renuka/Devi Maa
15. Maayi (2001)
16. Rakshasa Rajav (2001)
17. Thenali (2000) .... Meena
18. Doubles (2000)
19. Rhythm (2000) .... Chitra
20. Vaanathaipola (2000) .... Muthu`s Wife
21. Friends (1999) .... Padmini
22. Perivanna (1999)
23. Sneham Kosam (1999) .... Prabhavati 'Prabha' 'Guddiya'
24. Kusruthi Kuruppu (1998)
25. Varnapakittu (1997) .... Sandra/Alina
26. Porkkalam (1997)
27. Avvai Shanmugi (1996) .... Janaki
28. Miya Biwi Aur Saali (1996)
29. Muthu (1995) .... Ranganayaki
30. Rajakumaaran (1994)
31. Veera (1994) .... Devayanai "Devi"
32. Mutamestri (1993) .... Buchamma
33. Ejamaan (1993)
34. Rajeshwari Kalyanam (1993) .... Rajeshwari
35. Allari Mogudu (1992)
36. Allari Pilla (1992)
37. Ashwamedham (1992)
38. Sundara Kanda (1992) .... Venkateswarlu's Wife
39. En Rasavin Manisile (1991) .... Cholaiamma
40. Karthavyam (1991) .... Karuna
41. Seetharamaiah Gari Manavaralu (1991) .... Seeta
42. Sirivennela (1986) (as Baby Meena)
43. Rendu Rella Aaru (1985) (as Baby Meena)
44. Anbulla Rajanikant (1984) (as Baby Meena)