When you are looking to launch career for yourself, it will be always tempting to go for mass roles and themes.For, such a kind of cinema always holds an attraction for the newcomer.But mass films are a tightrope walk ---you never know which will click, and why. It is a strange phenomenon.
Sri is a typical mass entertainer with the protagonist almost cast in a super-hero role. But it seems that Manoj, looking for a major career break, has bitten more than he can chew. And he has also been let down by some sorry story choice. The film has everything ---good fights, some comedy, some sentiments. But the whole doesn't work. For this, the director and the scriptwriter have to cop a lot of flak.
The story is simply about Sriram (Manoj) and his love with Sandhya (Tamanna). Sriram, who lives with his widowed mother Durga (Sukanya) in Bhuvaneshwar, has to contend with the machinations of Bikshapathi (Devaraju). The villain and his gang have been running rough shod over everything they had set their eyes on. They had finished off their former points-man Basavanna (Mohan Babu) who had turned good after his marriage. As it happens, Sri is the son of Basavanna. Now he has to save his family's honor and Sandhya's father too. How he does do that forms the crux of the story.
Manoj looks much more at ease than he did in his first film Donga Dongadi. He fights with robust energy and dances with raw abandon. But he has to shed those extra kilos to really compete with the mainline heroes. To be fair to him, he tries his best. Full marks for effort.
Tamanna looks pretty. She has a simple role and doesn't have to do too much. It is Mohan Babu, as a baddie who turns good, who is spectacular. His screen presence and the natural insouciance are all such a treat to watch. The others have nothing much to do. They all amble through their characters.
Sandeep Chowtha's music is certainly good. It has the right youthful flavor. But somehow it doesn't fit with the essential tenor and feel of the film. Arun Kumar's camera work should go down in the plus section of the movie.
But Dasarath and the other names those are credited with handling script and story seem to have worked not with any unison. Dasarath's direction too seems strangely aimless, just allowing things to drift.
Sri, on the whole, may be a title of respect. But the film deserves little.
Rating **
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