Film: Chintakayala Ravi
Cast: Venkatesh, Anushka, Mamta Mohandas, Venu, Lakshmi, Chandramohan, Nikita, Ali, Brahmanandam, Sunil, Venumadhav, and others
Story: Kona Venkat
Music: Vishal - Sekhar
Background score: Manisharma
Lyrics: Chandrabose
Cinematography: K Ravindra Babu
Editing: Srikara Prasad
Choreography: Raju Sundaram
Banner: Lakshmi Narasinha Productions
Produced by: Nallamalupu Srinivas (Bujji)
Screenplay and directed by: Yogesh
Release date: October 2, 2008
CBFC Rating: U
Seshamamba (Lakshmi) is in belief that his son Chintakayala Ravi (Venkatesh) is working as software engineer in USA and she boasts it in her village but actually Ravi is works in a local bar there. His mother arranges a match for him with a rich village belle Lavanya (Mamata Mohandas) who okays the alliance as Ravi is software engineer. Meanwhile, Lavanya asks her New York buddy Sunita (Anushka) to find out the conduct of Chintakayala Ravi. Sunita and Ravi accidentally meet once and she gets bad impression on him for his mischievous acts. She also finds that he is actually bartender and informs her friend that causes rift between Ravi and Lavanya’s families. The rest of the movie is triangle drama between Ravi, Lavanya and Sunita.
Analysis
Like all recent Venkatesh’s films, Chintakayala Ravi has high on entertainment but low on content. Story of the flick is kitchidi of various Hindi movies (mostly Main Prem Ki Diwani Hoon and Hum Tum) but the backdrop of USA, Venkatesh’s performance, and comedy makes the film watchable. Adding mother sentiment to the predictable storyline made the movie more interesting, otherwise, it could have been very dull. Kona Venkat’s dialogues also are major asset. Other than that the movie treads on predictable pattern. First half of the movie is smooth and interesting but post the interval the narration is too slow and lengthy too. On the whole, the movie is just an okay.
Performances
Venkatesh gives good performance and shows his panache in comedy and sentiment scenes. After Venky, it is senior actress Lakshmi whose work is better. Her restrained performance adds strength to the sentiment scenes. Anushka’s performance is okay. Finally, Mamata Mohandass has got good role in Tollywood and also she comes with convincing act. Of the comedy gang, Sunil shines while Ali’s act as Nachami (an extension of his role in Chiruta), other toilet humor and some suggestive double meaning dialogues by Venky are in bad taste. Venu is apt for his brief role. So is Nikita. NTR’s guest appearance in the song 'Shava Shava' has no link and logic to the main storyline. Prakash Raj’s narrates the film with his voice over but it also can be done away with.
Of the technical cast, Kona Venkat (dialogues are good), Vishal- Sekhar (two songs – Bagunde..Bagunde and Enduko..Enduko are lilting) and cinematographer Ravindra Babu have come up with better work. Manisharma has just ‘copied’ the tunes from some of Yash Raj movies to provide background score. Chandrabose has penned all the songs and the lyrics in Enduko..Enduko are fantastic. He is giving best lyrics thesedays.
The scene where Venkatesh and Anushka act as husband and wife is just copy of Hum Tum (Rani and Saif do the same act in an apartment in Mumbai), like Saif arranges boys for Rani in Hum Tum, Venky does the same here. And in the climax, when Venky and Anushka perform as lovers in a game is Xerox copy of Main Prem Ki Diwani Hoon. Indeed, the basic plot of Chintakayala Ravi is similar to Main Prem Ki Diwani Hoon minus Abhishek’s role.
One appreciable aspect of the movie is the scenes shot in USA are rich and gives the movie very bright look. Producer Nallamapulu Bujji should be appreciated for this. Director Yogesh handles the movie okay but he has used all the old tricks for narration, not shown any novelty here.
Bottom-line
Chintakayala Ravi is just an okay. Mix of several Bollywood movies, the movie can be watchable for its comedy (in parts), good music and Venky’s performance.
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