Pelli Pusthakam - Devastatingly ill-executed
Portraying the heroine as a girl whose behaviour
borders on the whimsical takes rare sensibilities on the part of the
director. More so if the whimsical girl is a near-floozy character who
doesn't mind having a secret (if asexual) affair even while living with
the husband, with whom she even once gets romantic enough to plant a
meaning-laden kiss on his cheeks. The complexity gets that much more
difficult to depict.
But, trust Ramakrishna to keep things as awkward as
possible, kissing a goodbye to sensitivity/subtlety, going for an
in-your-face portrayal of his character's immaturity, thereby
successfully making us feel that the girl likes a guy for being
handsome/hot, more than for any other reason. Days before accepting
him, she says, "Rahul smart untadu."
The director seems to think that Rahul Ravindran and
Nithi Taylor are two brilliant actors whose kiddish acts can make the
audience understand the writer's intentions with precision. Thus, when
Rahul acts like an Amul boy merrily waiting for the first sexual
experience of his life on the day of marriage, we wonder whether the
director wants to tell us that the bava and the maradalu are, for all
the ogling behaviour they happily showcase, children at heart who are
not yet intent to have sex with each other, or make us simply laugh
without searching for a deeper meaning?
What kind of a husband leaves for Malaysia without
his wife accompanying him for the honeymoon? If he knows the girl ran
away from him deliberately, what purpose does it serve being thousands
of miles away and making anxious calls to friends in Hyderabad?
What kind of a director shows his heroine fall in
love with a guy without writing a scene in which they both are engaged
in some meaningful talk? How else would we know why the girl fell for a
guy after her marriage? She may see nothing in a guy more than his
beauty, but neither the man she is in love with is shown to sweeping her
off feet even once.
What kind of a director thinks that Nagineedu can be
relied upon to pull off comedy, melodrama and a mix of other conceivable
emotions as if he were as big as Prakash Raj?
Now the boy expresses shock at his maradalu falling
in line with her archaic grandpa and accepting to marry the bava. In
the next frame, we see the bava in awe of the maradalu's bride avatar,
as if he were mesmerized by her stunning looks, if not at the thought of
having a beautiful wife for the rest of his life. A blasphemous song,
that must make the fans of the original Pelli Pustakam song squirm in
their seats, plays in the background.
The Amul boy and his bride behave like drunkards or
retards or both.. Until the camera of Foxx Sports, telecasting LIVE the
country's most important match, captures the love affair of the wife
with Cherry, with a miraculous special focus on the girl and an
earth-shaking discussion between the two captains.
Then there is Cherry, about whose Greek God-like
looks (ROFL!) every girl in the film is seen talking. Every woman,
except the ladies in Nagineedu's family, lusts one guy or another, so
much so the Greek God is forced to ask three of them, "Do you think I am
a porn star?"