‘Sridevi Soda Centre’, a sad tale of love, tragedy

Hyderabad: Treating stories with caste prejudice needs utmost care. And like the way director Karuna Kumar does it in his debut movie ‘Palasa 1978’, the narrative in his latest romantic drama ‘Sridevi Soda Centre’ highlights the caste conflict and honour killing.

Karuna Kumar wanted his protagonist Sudheer Babu to be as realistic and rustic as possible. The actor plays an electrician named ‘Lighting Suribabu’ in a far-flung village of Godavari district. He earns a name for himself in the neighbouring villages for setting up lighting and DJ for parties and marriages. Actor Anandi played the role of Sodala Sridevi, a firebrand lady who doesn’t tolerate eve-teasing and injustice to young girls in the village.

Both fall in love within no time. The rivalry between Soori Babu’s family and the henchmen of the village head Kasi (played by actor Pavel Navageethan) gets worse after a shameful incident happened to Soori’s father. Soori Babu gets booked on the charges of attempt to murder. What’s in store for Soori when he is released from jail — is the story to know in the end.

Every frame of the movie resembles Karuna Kumar’s signature style. Stories of honour killings under the romantic genre usually replete with engaging sequences and drama. If the movies like Marathi romantic tragedy ‘Sairat’ spoke of the gruesome incidents of honour killing, Telugu film ‘Uppena’ is an absolute headturner.

Sudheer Babu has performed to his potential and skill in all his earlier movies. As a senior police officer in his last film ‘V”, he received good appreciation. His transformation as deglam village youth in this film has been quite a challenge for him. Apart from boat-racing sequences and the fight in the climax, his mannerism looked a slight mismatch and unconvincing. Village head Kasi, played by actor Pavel Navageethan, resembles an awkward monologue of a typical Telugu villain who laughs menacingly. Imagine what if his voice doesn’t sync with his expressions? — the crowd broke into laughter out of frustration.

Telugu girl Anandi’s screen presence is something her fans would vouch for. With the right expressions and emotions, the actor does it perfectly in the movie. Senior actor Naresh, as Anandi’s father, is too good to watch. The story progresses at its own pace and one shouldn’t expect an out-of-box screenplay apart from the routine pattern of elevating the hero.

Unlike his vision and conviction to tell realistic drama on screen, Karuna Kumar, after a brief period as a filmmaker, has fallen for tricky elements of commercial metres that drives Telugu mainstream cinema, and gave less impetus to his artistic vision.

The movie is marred with elementary scenes with poor characterisation. Some scenes would test your patience, take the example of a fight scene where the jail inmates dressed in civilian outfits.

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