‘Dear Comrade’: Rashmika’s skills wasted

The headline may surprise you, especially since Rashmika Mandanna has played one of the most substantial female roles in Telugu cinema in recent years in ‘Dear Comrade’.  But we aren’t talking about acting talent per se but her cricketing skills.

Rashmika is on record stating that she had to be in the ground to practise cricket for 4 months to prepare for the role of a cricketer in ‘Dear Comrade’.  But what do we get to see in the film?  Barely a smattering of cricketing moments.  She broke her ankle, had bruises on her hands and wounded her shoulder as well, relentlessly practising cricket for all those months.  In the end, her skills haven’t been shown sincerely in the movie.

It’s not like the film is short.  At about 170 minutes, there could have been five minutes of cricket.  Instead, there are fights showing off Vijay Deverakonda’s action skills, which is not integral to the story in any way.  

Did director Bharat Kamma chop off the cricketing scenes because he thought people wouldn’t be interested in them after watching ‘Majili’ and ‘Jersey’ only this year?  That is a probable reason.  But even then, since the film is about Rashmika’s character’s dreams, the omission was unwarranted.  Nobody is saying that the film should have been a semi-sports drama.  But five minutes of cricketing (divided between the two halves) is the minimum that was needed.