Tag Archives: Praveen

Dhuruvangal Pathinaaru

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Karthick Naren’s debut film is a police procedural thriller that twists and turns its way through retired cop Deepak’s memories of his final case. The story slowly builds up over time and the pieces all finally start to come together as Deepak relates his murder investigation to a young wannabe cop. The answers are kept well-hidden until the end, adding tension and intrigue to the tale. Although the final reveal isn’t as satisfying as it could have been, overall this is an excellent first film and one well worth revisiting before the release of Karthick Naren’s highly anticipated Naragasooran. 

The film begins with Deepak (Rahman) meeting the son of a friend in the police force. The idea is to try and dissuade him from joining up by relating the events that led up to Deepak’s enforced retirement after a serious injury. Once the scene is set, the film then moves into flashback mode to relate the events from 5 years ago, starting with a traffic accident on a wet night in Coimbatore. Three friends out driving hit and kill a pedestrian, but rather than calling for the police, they pile the body into the boot of the car and head for home. Mano (Praveen) and Melvin (Karthikeyan) are easily led by Fabian (Santhosh Krishna) who makes all the decisions and explains to them why they need to hide the body. Fabian is an arrogant rich kid with delusions of importance in his area, while Mano and Melvin are hangers-on with apparently no minds of their own. However, their reputation in the area is bad enough that the police investigation immediately targets them when a body is found near the park the next day.  

The murder victim has been shot, and although Deepak suspects Fabian is concealing something, he doesn’t believe he was involved with the murder. At the same time, the police are alerted to the disappearance of a young woman from a nearby block of flats where they find the murder victim’s blood on the wall. With the help of Sergeant Rajan (Pradheep) and his young colleague Gautham (Prakash Vijayaraghavan), Deepak starts to unravel the events that led to the car accident, the disappearance of Shruti (Yashika Aannand), the murder of Krish (Vinod Varma) and eventually to his own injuries. 

The case is convoluted, and there are plenty of twists in the story, including the disappearance of the accident victim’s body from Fabian’s car. There is also the puzzle of Shruti’s friend Vaishnavi (Anjana Jayaprakash) who reports her disappearance but seems to have lied about the time of her arrival in Coimbatore, and then vanishes when Deepak tries to find out why she concealed the truth. Throughout it all, what impresses is the matter of fact approach to the investigation while the realistic addition of mistakes and missteps by the investigating officers keeps a level of confusion that adds to the mystery. There is an ongoing issue with Deepak’s mobile phone for example. Firstly, he forgets to take his phone home, which means that no-one can contact him about the murder. Then he has an issue with his phone charging and has to use Rajan’s phone, while various other officers are frequently uncontactable by phone. Other mistakes occur because junior officers either forget to notify Deepak of a new finding, or simply dismiss evidence because they don’t think it sounds relevant. 

Rahman is excellent as Deepak, and his relationship with Prakash Vijayaraghavan as the young Constable Gautham provides a steady grounding for the narrative. Rahman is all businessman cop, there is no wasted emotion, and the case proceeds in a dry, but not dispassionate manner. There is plenty of concern for the missing girl, frustration about the lack of progress, but also some humour and camaraderie between the investigating officers. I love the attention to detail in each scene. The staging is perfect, from the tank of topical fish in Shruti’s apartment to the small vignettes that take place in the background in almost every external scene. As Deepak is talking to colleagues on the phone, Shruti’s neighbour and his wife are having a heated discussion in the background. It makes the following query from Rahman if Vaishnavi can stay with them more meaningful, along with the glance the neighbour gives his wife at the same time. 

My only real quibble with the film is the ending, which doesn’t flow on as well as Karthick Naren likely hoped. The idea behind the final reveal is good, but the relationship between Deepak and his visitor (Ashwin Kumar) has been too passive to make the final scenes feel as realistic as the rest of the film. Too, I have an issue with the explanation resting on ‘emotions’. Each act was supposedly carried out as a result of strong emotional turmoil, but to me that feels too much of a cop out. Normal people may feel angry, or rejected or any one of the other explanations given here, but that isn’t an excuse to just do whatever they want. While most of the actions depicted here are fairly usual for any murder mystery, they are not normally justified in any way except by saying that the perpetrator was a criminal. The end here suggests that a number of heinous acts can be explained, if not quite excused, by pushing some of the blame onto the victim and the way that they reacted to quite inexcusable behaviour. It’s a small point, but I think a dangerous one, to suggest that the victim has some culpability in a case such as the one depicted here.  

Without this final explanation, I think this would have been a much more satisfying film and one that I could whole-heartedly endorse. As it is, I think it’s technically very good, the performances by Rahman and Prakash Vijayaraghavan well worth watching, and the story intriguing and smartly developed. Overall, Dhuruvangal Pathinaaru is a well-constructed and captivating thriller, that was a well-deserved success for Karthick Naren and bodes well for his next venture. With a less socially disturbing message at the end this would have been a 4 star film, but as it is, for me it’s 3 ½ stars.

Karthikeya

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Karthikeya is an interesting mix of supernatural suspense and crime thriller with a soupçon of snakey vengeance thrown in for good measure. Chandoo Mondeti’s début has plenty of character development and a good storyline, although it does take a long time to get to the meat of the plot. However it starts well and the second half has plenty going on making Karthikeya a better than average watch.

The film begins with the unexplained death of an endowment officer investigating the closure of a temple in Subramanyapuram, although his inquiry seems to be completely unofficial. Shankar (Raja Ravindra) has time to make a final phone call before his death, but naturally hasn’t actually managed to finish his report detailing what’s behind the mystery of the temple before calling his friend. Doesn’t anyone in these films ever realize that boasting about their achievements before actually completing them is a surefire way to ensure they aren’t going to make it to the end of the movie? Especially when there are eavesdropping snakes to consider!

Having set the scene for a mystery thriller, the film then moves away from the story of the temple to introduce Karthik (Nikhil Siddharth) and his family. Karthik is a medical student who puts his faith in science and has no hesitation in spending the night in a haunted mortuary to prove that there is nothing supernatural going on. However when his superstitious mother (Tulasi) calls to report that his horoscope has him meeting a girl who will bring him luck, despite his skepticism Karthik keeps his eyes peeled and pays attention when he meets Valli (Swati Reddy) on campus. I like Karthik’s combination of respect for his mother’s beliefs with a scientific curiosity that drives him to find an answer to every question. He seems more normal and down to earth than most heroes and his tendency to reach for reason makes him a likeable and possibly a rather more intelligent character, despite his rather inane approach to romance.

As in many Telugu films the romance isn’t well handled, and the heroine has little more to do than apply the usual romance formula.

Step One – reject the guy
Step Two – see him in a better light and reconsider
Step Three – fall for the guy and declare your undying love

Swati does all of that perfectly well, but I was hoping for a little more given that her character is a dental student who should know better. Swati and Nikhil have a sweet camaraderie but no romantic sizzle and appear more like friends than lovers for most of the film. However, given that the focus of the story is the temple mystery this is perhaps for the best since the romance really adds little to the plot and is fairly irrelevant at the end of the day.

The story behind the temple is explained using a series of beautiful drawings that detail the building of the temple and the subsequent miracle that occurred on the full moon night of Karthika month. However the mystery started the previous year when one of the temple trustees collapsed during the annual ceremony and a few days later two lovers were found dead in the temple with snake bites. Rumours then began about strange noises and the death of the chief priest was the final straw resulting in the closure of the temple.

Kathik and his friends are sent to Subramanyapuram for a medical camp and end up staying in the temple trustee’s bungalow – a grand building in the forest with an imposing five headed snake sculpture on the top. The mystery is just the thing to keep Karthik entertained in between working at the medical camp and romancing Valli, despite his mother’s warning that he is in danger from snakes and the whole mystery involves a number of deaths from snake bite Valli is also on the camp since Subramanyapuram is her home village and her father (Tanikella Bharani) is a prominent village elder and astrologer who provides a good counter for Karthik’s scientific beliefs.

There is some amount of suspense as shadowy snakes are seen around the bungalow but unfortunately Chandoo Mondeti never develops any real feeling of menace which would have helped increase tension as Karthik gets closer to the answer. Although the police officer ACP Shankar (Kishore) involved in the case is also killed, his death is over very quickly and isn’t used to increase the suspense either. However the plot itself is more realistic than usual and even the dodgy science has some basis in fact even if it’s not completely believable. Chandoo Mondeti also includes some social issues including female infanticide and the shonky practices of fake spiritual leaders, blending them well into the plot and avoiding too moralistic a stance.

Nikhil is good as Karthik and balances his scientific beliefs with respect for the village traditions well. Satya and Praveen have small roles as his friends and provide most of the comedy which is less slapstick and more successful than usual. The rest of the support cast are also good, including Jogi Naidu as the temple handyman and Rao Ramesh as the Head of the Endowments office. There are no big song and dance numbers, with most of the songs used to show the developing romance between Karthik and Valli, however they fit well into the narrative and are generally enjoyable too.

Overall Karthikeya is a good story that could have done with a little more suspense but still keeps enough tension in the plot to keep it interesting right to the end. A few more snakes and less romance would have helped, but I could say that of most films really, and the CGI works well here to make the snake moments work well. Definitely worth a watch for an interesting mix of supernatural and murder mystery along with some good performances and clever use of science. 4 stars.