This film released when I was in my village. When I go there every year, it is a guarantee that I watch a film there. I watched the first film of my life (Shankardada M.B.B.S.) in my village. Some of the other films I watched there include Robo, Pokiri, Stalin, Greekuveerudu and this film Dookudu. This film broke records at the time. This film is in my watchlist forever with legendary films like Narasimha, Mirchi etc. I watched it again after watching maybe for 50 times. So, I tried to remove the nostalgia from me and objectively review this film for today. So, how is the film? Let us find out.
Dookudu is a 2011 Telugu Action romantic comedy drama aka commercial entertainer directed by Sreenu Vaitla starring Super Star Mahesh Babu and Samantha in the lead roles. The story revolves around Ajay an IPS officer who tries to exert revenge on the villain who is responsible for his father's death.
The screenplay of the film has the Srinu Vaitla's touch to it. With his writers Kona Venkat and Gopi Mohan, he made a very good film. It is essentially a star vehicle aka a masala entertainer. So, nothing special is achieved here. It has the same formula of 5 songs, 4 love scenes, 3 punch dialogues, 2 fight scenes and 1 larger than life hero. This film offers it in abundance but this time it works perfectly. It's length of 2hr 56min is justified by some awesome and hilarious dialogue between very well fleshed out characters in a very well knit screenplay. But, it is long and exhausting for us after the second half begins. The highlights of the film include the scenes between Mahesh Babu and Prakash Raj for emotion, Mahesh Babu with Brahmandam and MS Narayana for the best comedy like never, Mahesh Babu as police for superb punchlines.
So, you know the deal. This screenplay is essentially made for Mahesh Babu. Let's talk about that in the acting section. Overall, this film had set some high standards for commercial cinema.
The acting in the film is excellent. This film belongs to Mahesh Babu. It is most expressive that he has been in a film ever and his fans are still waiting for such an active role. Although, he tried it again for Sarileru Neekevvaru, I find this the superior performance.Samantha gets some great scenes with Mahesh Babu in the first half but has only 3 shots in the second half. She though acted really well. The big supporting cast of the film shine. Prakash Raj as the father proves his worth for the billionth time. He shares some great scenes where he really shines. Next, come the comedians. Brahmandam gets a full-length role for the film. This role (I consider) is one of the best roles he has ever done considering his long record-winning list of characters. We literally laugh out loud at the scenes featuring him. MS Narayana too gets to shine in a very comedic role. His showreel is some extra-ordinary comedic acting. The joint family of Mahesh Babu serve their roles well with senior actors such as Tanikella Bharani, Chandramohan, Padmaja etc. The family of the heroine as well with Nassar, Pragathi give some good performances. The review will become long if I go on mentioning about the other actors. Onto technical departments.
The technical departments of the film shine. The cinematography of the film is good. It's colour scheme too shines. I am not a fan of its editing though. It is literally cut after cut after cut. Maybe, the style should have changed. Also, the VFX cover-up is clearly evident and so it gets extremely dated. The music though is not. SS Thaman gives some good music. All the 6 songs I like very much. Especially, the hero introduction song. The BGM too is good. Keeping the lead actors limitations considered, the choreography and fights of the film have done a good job but if they tried to extract some more it would have been better.
Overall, in this lockdown I highly suggest film for non-locals as it contains some of the finest commercial masala writing with great punchlines, hilarious dialogue and scenes and one of the best performances by SSMB. It is on Disney+Hotstar for free and its hindi dub is available on YouTube. Sreenu Vaitla, please make a comeback soon.
The screenplay of the film has the Srinu Vaitla's touch to it. With his writers Kona Venkat and Gopi Mohan, he made a very good film. It is essentially a star vehicle aka a masala entertainer. So, nothing special is achieved here. It has the same formula of 5 songs, 4 love scenes, 3 punch dialogues, 2 fight scenes and 1 larger than life hero. This film offers it in abundance but this time it works perfectly. It's length of 2hr 56min is justified by some awesome and hilarious dialogue between very well fleshed out characters in a very well knit screenplay. But, it is long and exhausting for us after the second half begins. The highlights of the film include the scenes between Mahesh Babu and Prakash Raj for emotion, Mahesh Babu with Brahmandam and MS Narayana for the best comedy like never, Mahesh Babu as police for superb punchlines.
So, you know the deal. This screenplay is essentially made for Mahesh Babu. Let's talk about that in the acting section. Overall, this film had set some high standards for commercial cinema.
The acting in the film is excellent. This film belongs to Mahesh Babu. It is most expressive that he has been in a film ever and his fans are still waiting for such an active role. Although, he tried it again for Sarileru Neekevvaru, I find this the superior performance.Samantha gets some great scenes with Mahesh Babu in the first half but has only 3 shots in the second half. She though acted really well. The big supporting cast of the film shine. Prakash Raj as the father proves his worth for the billionth time. He shares some great scenes where he really shines. Next, come the comedians. Brahmandam gets a full-length role for the film. This role (I consider) is one of the best roles he has ever done considering his long record-winning list of characters. We literally laugh out loud at the scenes featuring him. MS Narayana too gets to shine in a very comedic role. His showreel is some extra-ordinary comedic acting. The joint family of Mahesh Babu serve their roles well with senior actors such as Tanikella Bharani, Chandramohan, Padmaja etc. The family of the heroine as well with Nassar, Pragathi give some good performances. The review will become long if I go on mentioning about the other actors. Onto technical departments.
The technical departments of the film shine. The cinematography of the film is good. It's colour scheme too shines. I am not a fan of its editing though. It is literally cut after cut after cut. Maybe, the style should have changed. Also, the VFX cover-up is clearly evident and so it gets extremely dated. The music though is not. SS Thaman gives some good music. All the 6 songs I like very much. Especially, the hero introduction song. The BGM too is good. Keeping the lead actors limitations considered, the choreography and fights of the film have done a good job but if they tried to extract some more it would have been better.
Overall, in this lockdown I highly suggest film for non-locals as it contains some of the finest commercial masala writing with great punchlines, hilarious dialogue and scenes and one of the best performances by SSMB. It is on Disney+Hotstar for free and its hindi dub is available on YouTube. Sreenu Vaitla, please make a comeback soon.
iMDB Rating : 7.4/10
My Rating : 8/10
❤️❤️❤️❤️
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