Siva Balaji, Ravi Varma's Sindhooram directed by Shyam Tummalapalli generated immense interest, as the film is named after yesteryear hit Sindhooram. The film's OTT partner will be revealed at a later date after the deal is inked. The film's teaser and trailer increased the curiousness and the film hit the screens on 26 January 2023.
Sindhooram story is all about naxalism and how lives got affected by those drawn towards their ideology and the crossfire between them and the cops. Sriramagiri village is engulfed by the feud between landlords and farmers over the daily wages. While farmers demand increases in wages, landlords headed by Eashwar Reddy (Ravi Varma), oppose them. Naxal leader Singanna (Siva Balaji) tries to take advantage of it. However, everything changes with the entry of Eashwar Reddy's daughter Sirisha Reddy (Brigida Saga) as the MRO. Where this leads to and what is the relationship between her and Ravi (Dharma) form the rest of the story.
Dharma who played the lead role is ok with his performance. Though he played second fiddle to seniors like Siva Balaji and Ravi Varma for most of the first half, he made his presence felt in the second half. He delivered powerful dialogues and showed impactful emotions. For all his hard work, most of the time, he came up with a single expression. He should work hard to reach the next level.
Brigida Saga played the female lead to perfection. She impressed with her dialogue delivery and screen presence. All through the film, she showed good emotions and took the viewers with her performance. Ravi Varma's body language is apt as the influential landlord. His towering personality made a lot of difference. He performed in a cool and composed manner.
Siva Balaji played a powerful role but he failed to elevate the scenes with his performance. He showed only a single expression and this impacted the film in a big way. Others like Keshav, Dayanand, and Naga Mahesh performed according to their roles.
Sindhooram story penned by Shyam Tummalapalli sought to address multiple problems that are plaguing society. He started the narration with the landlords and farmers conflict and then the Naxalites and police conflict, upper and lower caste differences, and how people from either side take advantage of the oppressed to make merry. He also tried to take on the communists and their ideology in a hard-hitting manner.
Shyam Tummalapalli most of the time, tried t launch a direct attack on communism and how dictators in Russia, Germany, China oppressed free speech and crushed the opposition mercilessly, and sought to expose the double standards of the communists. Though the intention was right, the director most of the time became preachy during the conversation with the Naxalites. The story shown in Sindhooram is seen by viewers for many decades and the screenplay lacked real twists and turns. His direction looked amateurish as he beat around the bush most of the time.
Jeswin Prabhu's editing left a lot to be desired. While there are many slow scenes in the first half, the second half scenes are repeated and dragged a lot. It ended up testing the patience of the viewers. Hari Gowra's songs are situational. The title song is powerful and hard-hitting. The lyrics are good and the singers made a good impact. The background score is good. Keshav's cinematography is good. He showed the village atmosphere in a realistic way. Dialogues penned by Kishore Sri Krishna are hard-hitting and intense. Production values of Sri Lakshmi Narasimha Movie Makers are average.
Altogether, Sindhooram directed by Shyam Tummalapalli is a hard-hitting take on communism. War against communist ideology. To some extent though the director Shyam succeeded, in he end it turned out to be e mediocre project and routine docudrama. Considering all these aspects, Cinejosh goes with a 2 Rating for Sindhooram.