KSD: AppalRaju Review

KSD-Appalraju is Ramgopal Varma's comeback to Telugu cinema after almost a decade. This movie which was touted as the spoof on Telugu film industry narrated through the hassles of an amatuer film maker struggling to make a movie strictly by his own script, had high expectations on it. Varma created hungama for the launch of this movie by inviting Sridevi and Boni Kapoor. He adopted every publicity stunt to get this flick noticed including launching one song of the film every week, a hilarious song on directors in the industry and one on publicity stunts of film makers.

Story

Appalraju(Sunil) from Amalapuram is an avid movie buff. He spends most of his day at Rambha theatre in Amalapuram watching films. When his dad(Chalapati Rao) chides his for the same, he swears not to come back to Amalapuram unless he becomes a big director in Tollywood and heads to Hyderabad.In the city, he has a friend Subbulu(Rajesh) who is left Amalapuram years ago to become a hero in Telugu films but in vain. Through him, he attends an audio launch of a film where Appalraju makes contact with Raakhi(Raghubabu) a producer who reads his script 'Nayaki' and decides to help him.Appalraju also manages to get the dates of heroine Kanishka(Saakshi) for his heroine oriented film 'Nayaki'. However, the manager at corporate firm which has to finance this film agrees to fund the project only if a big hero like 'Babu' is in the movie. Though Babu and Kanishka are initially in love with each other, they have a break up once the project is all set to take off. The rest of the story is on whether Appalraju convinces Babu and Kanishka, his troubles in financing the film, his unwilling compromises in the script, casting et al.

Performances

Sunil who is the title bearer of the movie is innocent, genuine and honest in his performance. He had done a good job in potraying the vulnerabilities of an amatuer film maker and the grief one undergoes while compromising on the script due to commercial factors. His dance was superb and makes us drop our jaws to the floor.Swati is barely seen in the film and has no importance at all.One wonders why she has been chosing such insignificant roles offlate. Her expressions too are so cliched and it is hightime she introspected her routine histrionics which she thinks is her USP.Raghubabu acted as if he was born to be the producer/manager of the film. His shinny shirt and thick gold chain with faded jeans are very well suited to his role. Bramhanandam who plays Shankar Anna, the goon and Venumadhav his gunman are the saving graces of the film. Tanikella Bharani, M S Narayana, Suman Shetty, Ajay and Adarsh are just about alright though nothing praise worthy.

Clap worthy moments

• The song criticising the directors of Telugu cinema was well choreographed. The pictures used, costumes and masks of actors are well timed.
• Dialogues making fun of Ramgopal Varma's Shiva and his other films made audience smile for Varma's jokes on himself.
• Bramhanandam's dialogues and the lyrics of songs he pens are overtly funny. For instance 'Ringu Road Kada Ranganayaki... Bongulanti Ninnu Choosi Prema Dilki' makes the audience laugh out loud.
• There are other Lol moments in Bramhy's dialogues. He says 'Kanti Tho Chooste Order...Kannu Tho Chooste Murder'.
• The lyrics of all the songs in this film are situational are whistle worthy for their catchy words.
• Swati sang the song 'Unbelievable this is Raju' and Bramhy sang his song ' Naa Peru Srisailam' which were shot on themselves and hence the emotion was perfect on their faces.

What makes audience run away?

• As the title suggests Katha-Screenplay-Darsakathvam, the film fails on all these three grounds.
• The details about film industry are extremely exaggerated and over the top.
• Anyone with a common sense will laugh at the way TV reporter was shown shying away to ask a heroine a question.
• Varma perhaps doesn't know that TV channels don't invite film critics to review movies live on air.
• The scenes where Sunil and Raghubabu argue in autos and infront of ice-cream parlour makes one cringe.
• The climax of the film is the nail in the coffin and doesn't make sense to the story.Besides a child like chasing scene is sure to give your patience a serious test.
• Firstly not a single frame in this movie looks like RGV's movie.
• The cinematography of this film is pathetic.
• The comedy scenes are yawn inducingly boring and cranky. -Actors Swati, Kallu Chidambaram, Kovai Sarala, Jayaprakash Reddy, Kota Srinivasa Rao had hardly anything to do in the film

Verdict

KSD-Appalraju is extremely hyped and overrated film which was painful to view. Very badly made and narrated flick, absolutely not worth your money.