Early Tollywood: RAVI BABU

12.04.2009

Ravi Babu's AMARAVATHI (2009) Movie Review by Greatandhra

Film: Amaravathi

Rating: 2.5/5

Banner: Bhavya Creations

Cast: Ravi Babu, Nandamuri Tarakaratna, Bhumika, Sneha, Sindoora, Raghava, Subhashini, Kota, Paruchuri Gopalakrishna, Kasi Viswanath and others

Music: Sekhar Chandra

Fights: Kanal Kannan

Editing: Shankar

Cinematography: Sudhakar Reddy

Director: Ravi Babu

Producer: V Anand Prasad

Release date: 04/12/2009

Ravi Babu is slowly creating a brand for himself with his different approach towards film making. He has now arrived with ‘Amaravathi’ and how chilling and thrilling it has been, let us see.

Story:

The emergency help line 108 gets a call that a nine month pregnant woman’s life is in danger. By the time the staff reaches there, the baby is taken away by cutting the stomach. This is done by a psychopath (tarakaratna). Such things repeat so the special task force gets Venkat (Ravi Babu) to investigate. He manages to catch the killer but then even when the interrogation is going on, similar incidents happen outside. How does that happen? How does Venkat solve the case? All this forms the rest of the story.

Performances:

Tarakaratna
His face was covered with a mask so that his expressions need not be seen, as long as it was seen, he was showing few blank expressions and did an okay job.

Ravi Babu
As a cop, he did his job. Since he has already proved himself as a director and an actor, he has done justice to his bit.

Sneha
As Ravi Babu’s wife, she has done okay job. Her romantic scene with Ravi Babu gathered a good response from the audience.

Sindoora
As Ravi Babu’s colleague, she looked sleek and stylish. Apart from toting the gun, there was not much she could do in terms of expression or performance. There was not even that much scope for her.

Bhumika
She is as usual, sometimes as a mad girl, sometimes in a graceful manner, her role was very limited.

Others
Kota, Paruchuri, Kasi Viswanadh, Subhashini did their bit as required and added value to the film.

Technical crew
As his previous movies, Ravi Babu has taken ‘Amaravathi’ in a very high quality technical standard. Though he has taken the movie from the start to the end in a gripping manner, fifteen minutes after the interval tends to give an idle time to the audience. After that, he has kept them engaged completely and here and there, he also mixed comedy and showed his sense of humor.

For a thriller movie, background score and cinematography are two very key aspects so both departments did very well. The cinematography gave a mood to the audience while the background score had enough punch and shock moment in it. The dialogues were weak, the screenplay was alright, costumes were hyped, art department was creative, editing was nice but it could have been crisp during the first half.

Analysis:

The film ‘Anasuya’ showed heart, kidneys, eyes and other organs being taken away by a psychopath (Ravi Babu) and in ‘Amaravathi’ Tarakaratna came in the role of a baby lifter by cutting the stomach of the pregnant women. But then, the subject of hypnotism, the way it was used for the film and the twists that were deployed using this gave a new feel. The flip side of the coin is some unusually silly things. For instance –

Sneha ‘runs’ to open the door when the bell rings, this when she is 9 months pregnant

The special task force outfit and the office set up, cars, it was obviously a copy of the SWAT teams in the US, how absurd can that be? That could have been realistic

A fat and flabby guy like Raghava goes to catch the psychopath in the climax, is that the fitness levels of the special task force?

The film will appeal to those who like Ravi Babu movies or thriller genre of films. But if you compare it with ‘Anasuya’ then there is disappointment in store for you

12.19.2008

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Ravi Babu's Nachavule (2008) Review

Film: Nachchaavule
Rating: 3/5
Cast: Tanish, Madhavi Latha, Kasi Vishwanath, Raksha, Narasimha, Naveen, Kamesh etc
PRO: Venu Gopal
Editing: Marthand K Venkatesh
Dialogue: Ravi Babu
Action: Kanal Kannan
Art: Narayana Reddy
Lyrics: Bhaskarabhatla
Choreography: Nixon
Camera: Sudhakar Reddy
Music: Sekhar Chandra
Screenplay: Satyanand
Producer: Ramoji Rao
Director: Ravi Babu
Released On: 19 Dec 2008

The film 'Nachchaavule' turned heads with posters. Two monkeys and two puppets have promoted the movie from posters and the crowds have turned up in good number. That's a rare promotion stunt and is the film in tune with anticipation. Let us go into details.

Story:

The story starts with the narration of a young man without his face on screen. Lavkumar (Tanish) wishes to have girl friend since his childhood. His love for girl friends grows big as he grows older. But he finds no right girl.

In the process he happens to meet a girl Anu (Madhavi Latha) and some dramatic sequences develops friendship between them. Lavkumar asks Anu to be his girl friend and the latter agrees with some conditions. But the girl herself breaks the conditions and falls into deep love with the boy. How things turn from there.

How Lavkumar changes after friendship with Anu? Who is right and who is wrong? How the relation affects them and how that culminates in climax has to be watched on screen.

Performances:

New actors Tanish and Madhavi Latha did well in their roles. Madhavi Latha has got sharpness in features as well as in performance. She may shine well if given opportunities. Tanish is good and he gave out reasonable performance in first attempt. He acted well in pathos scenes as well.

Narasimha as hero's friend got reasonable role in first half. Kasi Vishwanath, who acted as hero's father portrayed a levelheaded role. Raksha was seen in a middle class mother's role. Kamesh is ok in the role of heroine's father. Naveen, the guy who acted as villain is ok.

Coming to technical departments and other faculties Bhaskarabhatla's first song 'Pavu thakkuva thommidi…' is enjoyed by masses and youth. Music is reasonable but not outstanding and haunting. Screenplay is rational and appears to have done with attention to detail.

Director Ravi Babu gave a balanced film this time. He has been showing his abilities in handing all sorts of genres. Initially he entered with rocking comedy films like 'Allari' and gave a twist with horror flick 'Anasuya' and now a pathos entertainer 'Nachchavule'.

Analysis:

Ravi Babu made a sincere attempt to bring awareness for youngsters and parents regarding the conditions prevailing in society in the name of 'social moving' and 'boy friend culture'. He has shown his brilliance in narration and sensibility in dialogue writing. First half runs with good pace while second half appears little heavier with sentiment and emotion. But still the second half holds right grip. The climax would have concluded on the hospital stretcher itself. Concluding the movie with a general 'cool climax' without any tragic affect has diluted the purpose to some extent. The impact would have been better had there been some tragic feel at the end for this flick.

The negative impact of boy friend- girl friend culture, misuse of cell phone cameras among youth, irresponsible nature of youngsters are aptly taken on to celluloid by the director. He has tried to teach a moral lesson indirectly which is indeed a need for today's society. Within in the narration he has also shown how a husband should love his wife and how a young man should be responsible towards his family as well as the tender feelings of the people those love him.

The title, promotion and the content are sensible and in tune with contemporary time.

Source: Great Andhra

6.20.2008

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ANASUYA (2007)

Genre: Horror/Thriller

Type: Straight

Banner: Flying Frogs

Cast:
Bhumika Chawla
Abbas
Ravi Babu
Melkote
Sameer
Chalapati Rao
Harsha Vardhan
Nikhita
Ankita
Revathi

Music: Sekhar Chandra

Cinematography: Sudhakar Reddy

Stunts: Kanal Kannan

Dialogues: Nivas

Screenplay: Paruchuri Brothers (Paruchuri Venkateswara Rao , Paruchuri Gopal Krishna )

Written & Directed by: Ravi Babu

Producer: Ravi Babu

Release date: 21 December 2007

Story

anasuya Anasuya is an orphan and a post graduate in criminal psychology. She joins a TV channel as a reporter. She is entrusted with a job to crack the secrets behind mysterious serial killings followed by a collecting of body organs. The killer always leaves a rose at the crime scene as the proof of his identity. Meanwhile, a cop (Abbas) is also bestowed with the responsibility to solve the mystery. The rest of the story is all about how Anasuya chases the serial killer and unravels the mystery behind his killings.

Artists Performance

anasuya Bhumika Chawla is perfect in the role of Anasuya. A character like Anasuya needs an able actress like Bhumika Chawla who has got command over histrionics. She did a good job with subtle and terse expression. Abbas is alright for the role in male lead. Ravi Babu looks deadly and he shaved off his eyebrows to look ghastly. Ankita did a miniscule role and Nikhita did a vital role. Harsha and Sameer did well among the others.

Technical Departments:

Story - screenplay - direction: Story of the film is good. But what makes this film special is the screenplay. Each and every character is nicely connected with the main storyline. The director succeeded in maintaining the suspense of the film till interval. But the film goes on a predictable mode in the second half. Direction of the film is adequate.

Other departments: Music (especially the background score) by Sekhar Chandra is good. Cinematography by Sudhakar Reddy is an asset. The director did not use much lights for the night shots as it is a thriller. Nivas dialogues are adequate. Editing by Marthand K Venkatesh is fair.