Rating: 2/5
Starring: Lakshmi Manchu, Chaitanya Krishna, Naresh, Aamani and others
Direction: Praveen Sattaru
Music: Mickey J. Meyer
Cinematography: Suresh Ragutu
Production: Chanakya Booneti
Your Rating: [ratings]
Chandamama Kathalu Movie Review
Story :
Chandamama Kathalu is about eight intertwined stories:
Saaradhi (Kishore) is a lone parent of school going girl. He is seen as a father who worries about his daughter’s health
Lisa Smith (Lakshmi Manchu) is seen as a frustrated model walking towards the twilight of her career. She is seen struggling to come up with the latest terms of her life due to career slowdown.
Aamani (Saritha) is a lady who just becomes a widow, then comes Naresh (Mohan) in to her live. They share a relationship 30 years ago and in the present, they slowly move towards a new beginning.
Krishnudu (Venkateswara Rao) is a obese whose ambition is to get married before his hair start greying.
Chaitanya Krishna (Raghu) is seen as a college going calm guy who eyes a politician’s daughter. There is an other side in him which is exactly the opposite.
Abhijeet (Ashraf) runs a kirana store runs in to Richa Panai (Haseena) who gives him a ‘kiss-at-first-sight’ experience.
Krishneswar Rao is an aspirational beggar who strives for a house costing 12 Lakhs and he has a savings of about 10 Lakhs!!!!!
Naga Shaurya (Raghu) has a tragic story as he had to marry a girl accidentally due to the girl’s grand mother.
Performances:
Director Praveen Sattaru in one of the promotional interviews talks about using Algebra to give equal screen space to all the characters in the film. But it is not convincing on the screen. Kishore is natural. Lakshmi Manchu looked more like her real life character and Naresh resembled more like Lakshmi Manchu when he tries to speak English. Aamani is elegant in her come back. Krishnudu plays a routine ;fatso being booed by every one’ character. Rest of the characters are pretty ordinary.
Technical Performances:
We have not seen many anthologies in Telugu. Off course they are not easy to handle. Praveen Sattaru had attempted one such film but could not convincingly pull it off. The characters of the film and the eight different stories do not have proper coherence for the audience to connect. In short his intent is honest but execution is flawed.
Cinematography of Suresh is neat. Mickey J. Meyer’s songs are not effective but the rerecording is good. Editing for an anthology is very difficult and it is obvious in the work of Dharmendra Kakarla. Production Values are decent.
Final Verdict:
Chandamama Kathalu is a quite a boring film. The first half of the film is dreadfully slow paced and the second half gets pass marks. If you got to watch the film this weekend, find your own reasons as I can not!
