Shubha Pradam Movie Review

Behind the Movie Shubha Pradam: A movie from legendary director K. Vishwanath is always welcomed by tasteful Telugu audience. Successful comedy hero Allari Naresh along with beautiful Manjari Phadnis making the lead pair for this K. Vishwanath film and Music from Mani Sharma have raised quick interest among audience. Let us see, was it all ‘Shubha Pradam’ for them?

In the Movie Shubha Pradam: Movie starts in Alappuzha of Kerala where in Indumathi (Manjari Phadnis)  is the only daughter in a traditional musical family where three brothers (Vizag Prasad, Ashok Kumar and Gundu Sudarshan) live united. During Akhila Kerala Telugu Samakhya Musical celebrations, SP Balasubramanyam is invited for a Live Concert and incidentally, Chakri (Allari Naresh) who is not a part of his troop ends up as key performer. Mesmerized by Chakri’s performance and his charm, Indumathi falls in love. When Chakri expresses the love before the family members of Indumathi, his careless attitude and no seriousness towards life make them fire him away.

Yet, they get united after separation of one year by some silly wits of Chakri. Now, Chakri and Indu start their new married life but a series of shocks are to flow. Chakri works as a porter (Dholi) in temple town of Kamalapuri and his job is to lift the old pilgrims to top of the hill for the darshan of goddess using his Dholi.

Here comes a twist, multi millionaire businessman Shivananda Murthy (Sharat Babu) comes into the lives of Chakri and Indu as a guest and he has a flashback where in his only grand daughter Sindhu (Manjari Phadnis), look alike of Indu is killed in an acid attack during her fight against Ragging in colleges. Now, Shivananda Murthy in his old age wants to get close to Indu and spend his rest of life. How did movie take a turn from here on forms rest of the story.

Values and Out of the Movie Shubha Pradam: Frankly speaking, Shubha Pradam will not impress the  regular crowds at any point of time in its two and half hour journey. One might be shocked watching the movie questioning themselves, is this really directed by the same Kalathapaswi Vishwanath?  Soul and feel that are normally observed in Vishwanath’s movies is totally absent here. Characters behave without any logic and prominence. Audience for the first half get entirely disappointed when they sum up the story.

Vishwanath has made a disastrous attempt of getting comedy out of Allari Naresh in traditional format. Once movie enters second half, Allari Naresh gets into his regular groove. Saving grace for the movie was Manjari Phadnis who is really gorgeous. With a perfect body shape for performing classical dance movements, Manjari stole the major share of credit and Suneeta’s dubbing lifted her role. If Sharat Babu was apt for the role of old grand father, AVS, Vizag Prasad, Gundu Sudarshan and others did as per directors advise.

Next to speak about is Music from Mani Sharma which is a complete let down. Strong points in a Vishwanath’s movie will be music but none of the songs were heart touching. Not alone lyrics even dialogues were insipid. Following all these minus points is low standard production values.

Being Telugus by origin, we never dare to doubt the caliber of master filmmaker K. Vishwanath and we are grown watching his films but with disastrous show of ‘Swarabhishekam’ in the past and pathetic show of ‘Shubhapradam’ now, it can be infered that time for the change has arrived. With genuinity and real substance of Vishwanath’s core ideas missing, never are these films to be patronaged as what happened earlier. Yes,  K. Vishwanath might still have the stamina to contribute for Telugu industry with his movies but surely not in this format.

There is no tempo in the movie for total first half and it bores you more than what is needed. Come second half, story picks up only when flash back is revealed. With poor show by every department, suggestibe for Allari Naresh to go back for his regular movies than experimenting with his image.

Cinejosh Verdict of the Movie Shubha Pradam:  Vishwanath’s touch of elegance totally missing.

                                                                                                        Reviewed by Srivaas