KANTARA (KANNADA) (2022)

Director Rishab Shetty's Kantara (aka mystic forest) is a story of tribals who inhabit the forest in coastal Karnataka - Tulunadu region. Rishabh has also written the story and stars as the lead. The story which is largely set in 1990s strings together strands from an earlier century as well as 1970s, weaving these three timelines in a brilliant blend of mythology, folklore and movie magic.

The narrative yarn is spun around multiple conflicts - some overt and some simmering undercurrents which are on the verge of eruption. Nevertheless, the primary fault line traces the near unending conflict between humans and nature as the humans continue in their vain quest to conquer, own and control nature - land and resources - to satiate their utmost avarice.

Rishabh Shetty mounts the movie on a canvas that is deeply drenched in the earthy hues of its milieu and richly textured with unique cultural ethos of the coastal Karnataka.

His story presents an eclectic mix of emotions ranging from resonant spirituality, rustic love, healthy oodles of irreverent humour, primal rage, greed that is almost genetic as it transcends and consumes generations, juxtaposed with firmly held beliefs of a close knit community and how such beliefs permeate and define their lives.

Within moments into the film, Rishabh magically transports the viewers to the verdant space where his story unfolds with Kola, Kambala, nocturnal hunting and much much more, thanks largely to the songs and background score by B. Ajaneesh Loknath along with the superb cinematography of Arvind S Kashyap who conjure up an immersive experience.

Rishabh Shetty excels in the role of Shiva as he emotes with ease through the character arc which sees him go from a irresponsible ruffian to the transformation with a final tour-de-force. He is complemented well by a supporting cast including an excellent Kishore, ever-dependable Achyuth Kumar, Pramod Shetty, Sapthami Gowda and the rest. Rishabh's control on the medium as a director is evident through the entire runtime of Kantara, especially as it crescendos to a phenomenal final stretch that packs the potency akin to a force of nature.

Rishabh the writer cooks up a heady cocktail - masterfully mixing up the sensational with the subtle and the surreall; this is one happy "made-in-heaven" marriage of mystique philosophy and mass masala moments.

A delectable coastal Karnataka delicacy that is cooked to perfection to delight the discerning viewers.

As the final visual vanishes from the screen, the viewers leave with the lingering legend of Kantara lurking in their minds.

RATING - 4/5

AN UNFORGETTABLE & UNMISSBALE EXPERIENCE !!

HERO (KANNADA) (2021)

Hero is a barber in a small town in Karnataka. Heroine has ditched him and is married to a dreaded gangster. Villain is extremely cruel, sadistic, has an alligator for pet and commands a gang of brutal henchmen. When the frustrated hero gets an opportunity to enter the house of villain set in the middle of a vast estate, hoping to kill the heroine for ditching him, all hell breaks loose. Add a few more oddball characters like a zany cook, a petrified vet brought in to treat the alligator's loss of appetite and a henchman who is obsessed with hunting wild boars. Throw in a truckload of weapons from primitive clubs, knives in every size to  guns and bombs which are used in stylized action set-pieces choreographed with gusto by Vikram Mor. What follows is a weird, whacky, bloody black comedy that takes us on a rollercoaster ride which is engaging to the most part.

The fact that the entire movie was made by a cast and crew of 24 members in the height of COVID lockdown makes it all the more appealing.

Rishabh is spot on as the bumbling barber; Ganavi provides the ideal foil as she brings the right amount of charm, guts and intrigue to her role. The rest of the cast who are also multitasking as miscellaneous crew members do a competent job.

Ajaneesh Loknath revs up the sequences adding an all new dimension to the movie with his pitch-perfect score as well as lilting songs while cinematographer Aravind Kashyap excels with his verdant visuals as well as the action sequences which are superlative.

Debutant director M Bharath Raj who has co-written this gem deserves kudos for delivering a deliciously dark comedy which could make Tarantino happy. He clearly holds the potential to become the latest addition to the celebrated club of the brave new wave of Kannada auteurs consisting of Pawan Kumar (Lucia), Anup Bhandari (Rangitaranga), Hemanth Rao (Godhibanna Sadharana Mykattu  and Kavaludari) and the spectacular Shetty duo - Rakshit (Ullidavaru Kandante) and Rishabh (Kirik Party).

A GENUINE TREAT !!

RATING - 4/5

PS - Streaming on ZEE5

AVANE SRIMANNARAYANA (KANNADA/TELUGU/TAMIL) (2019)

This is a story set in the 80s in a fictional South Indian village of Amaravathi which is reeling under the sinister shadow of a gang of deadly dacoits called Abhiras. The story kicks off in the form of a lost bounty of treasure that the dacoits are after and is hidden from them by a band of visiting theatre artists who get greedy. Fifteen years after, Rakshit Shetty enters the village as the titular maverick cop with malleable morals who is also in pursuit of this lost treasure. Thus begins an epic fantasy tale that is fantastic fun oozing, nay, overflowing with style.

Filled with action, adventure and flamboyance in almost every frame - the narrative utilises the grandeur and richness of movies as a medium to the hilt to exceptional effect. Imagine Jack Sparrow as a cop in a wild western terrain in the search of a hidden treasure, a la Mackenna's gold set to the sensibilities of a Guy Ritchie directorial.  The result is a heady mix that combines multiple genre elements of revenge, drama, action, mythology, mystery, theatre, thriller and irreverent black humour with equal aplomb. 

Leading man Rakshit Shetty and his team of writers weave an incredible story and a grandiose narrative that transports us - lock, stock and barrel - to this fictional landscape of Amaravathi  on  a witty quest to locate this lost treasure. Rakshit Shetty radiates charm and excels in his comic timing as he handles most of the heavy lifting as the lead writer and the leading man. He is ably supported by veteran Achyuth Kumar as an apt sidekick providing perfect foil as well as meaty cameos by Balaji Manohar as the prime antagonist Jayarama and Shanvi Shrivastava.

Composer B. Ajaneesh Loknath’s cooks up a background score to match the quirky proceedings while the cinematography by Karm Chawla captures the unfolding adventure in grand visual tapestries

On the flip side, one has to concede that..

Yes.. It does tend to overdo the style quotient and smarts ..

Yes.. It does feel more than a tad stretched with a run time spanning an overwhelming 186 minutes..

Nevertheless, it is a jolly good ride for the most part as director Sachin Ravi, Rakshit and their team are in fine form delivering their wares in aces in an ambitious venture that is set to expand the horizons of Sandalwood cinema much more than KGF ever did or could.

AN EXUBERANT ENTERTAINER !!

RATING -3.5/5

GANTUMOOTE (aka BAGGAGE) (KANNADA) (2019)

In Gantumoote, debutante director Roopa Rao beautifully blends a coming of age tale with an in-depth character study of her protaganist - Meera, who is also our narrator. The major portions of the movie which is set in the early 1990s revolves around an intense teen romance of Meera with her classmate Madhu. It is a romance that lingers on to create ripples through her life well into her adulthood. This teen love story is showcased with a rare sensitivity and without any frills that cry out for attention or sundry commercial compromises.

Director Roopa Rao builds the narrative of this school time romance with a good deal of poise and grace. The budding interests, and its evolution  into a warm romance is captured with great care and authenticity punctuated through poetic voice-overs, several stolen glances, those sheepish looks, multiple magical moments when two sets of eyes converge to exchange private notes within a crowded classroom and the loving gazes that sets both the hearts aflutter. 

The fact that she could convey the intensity of the emotional tumult within Meera as she goes through the journey of life without translating the same into melodramatic scenes is a testimony to the maturity of Roopa Rao and her mastery over the medium.

The cinematography by Sahadev Kelavadi is unobtrusive as it captures the precious moments without compromising on their innocent charm. Background score and songs by Aparajith Sris has the rythm of a summer day's gentle breeze that caresses the back of our neck to pleasently surprise us.

Roopa and her team deserve kudos for their apt casting choices for the lead pair as well as the entire supporting cast. Teju Belawadi dives into the heart of the character of Meera and aces the entire palette of emotions with those big expressive eyes. Nishchith Korodi provides a perfect foil as he rings in the right kind of boyish charm as well as the vulnerabilities of Madhu.

Gantumoote feels like a personal conversation that we have with our closest of friends. During the course of the movie, we feel similarly connected to Meera as she confides in us and bares her soul. Both the debutantes - the director, Roopa Rao and the lead actor Teju Belawadi - have heralded themselves as talents to look out for the future.

Overall, Gantumoote is a delicately crafted, deeply personal, poetic movie that surprises you often with its unique perspective and is sure to stay on with the viewers long after they have watched it. 

A GEM ! A MUST WATCH !!

RATING - 4/5

PS - Gantumoote is streaming on Amazon Prime Video

LUCIA (KANNADA) (2013)

My first ever Kannada movie, Lucia, turned out be a veritable delight and an engrossing entertainer. Lucia opens with the following metaphysical verse from the 16th century Kannada philosopher-poet-saint Kanakadasa - 

Are you a creature of illusion? or illusion is your creation?

Are you a part of the body? Or is the body a part of you?

Is space within the house? Or the house within space? 

Or are both space and the house within the seeing eye? 

Is the eye within the mind? Or the mind within the eye? 

Or are both the eye and the mind within you?

Does sweetness lie in sugar, or sugar in sweetness? 

Or do both sweetness and sugar lie in the tongue?

Is the tongue within the mind? Or the mind within the tongue? 

Or are both the tongue and the mind within you?

Does fragrance lie in the flower? Or the flower in fragrance? 

Or do both the flower and fragrance lie in the nostrils? 

I cannot say, O Lord Adikeshava of Kaginele,

O! peerless one, are all things within you alone?

It is followed by another famous quote from the Chinese philosopher Zhuangzi which is as under -

I dreamed I was a butterfly, 

flitting around in the sky; 

then I awoke. 

Now I wonder: 

Am I a man who dreamt of being a butterfly, 

or am I a butterfly dreaming that I am a man?

While the immortal verse of the poet sets the tone and is the underlying thread that runs through the movie which explores themes of reality, virtual world of dreams and their intersection in a unique and intricately constructed plot, it is the the quote from the Chinese philosopher which appears more apt for Lucia's plot line which is set in two parallel tracks for the most part which converge and enmesh into each other towards the finale.

Lucia begins with a heavily bandaged patient surviving in life support after a fall from a high rise which has triggered a media debate on euthanasia. Simultaneously, we see that the police are investigating the cause of his state even as they are trying to round up a gang involved in drug trade with the help of an investigator from Mumbai. 

A swift cut to a flash back shows the protagonist Nikki (Nenasam Satish) as a poor villager in the metro working as an usher in a dilapidated single screen theater run by his benefactor Shankaranna (an excellent Achyuth Kumar). Thanks to Shankaranna's steadfast rule that his theater will only play Kannada movies, he finds himself deep in debt with the theater in a downward spiral of loss with predatory creditors and land sharks circling to gobble up the property. Despite the paltry remuneration he receives, Nikki loves his job at the movies and reveres Shankaranna. However, he is afflicted with insomnia which forces him to wander the streets late at nights. One such night, when he is presented with a magic pill - Lucia - that could cure his insomnia and could also help him in lucid dreaming (hence the name), he accepts it gleefully. On consuming the pill, he enters a self-constructed dream world where he is Nikki, a reigning superstar in Kannada cinema. 

From this point on, the movie traverses the two planes of his real world as well as dreamscape. The people and events from both these planes reflect each other. So, when Nikki, in his dreamscape, falls in love with an aspiring actress Shwetha (Shruthi Hariharan), the theater torchbearer Nikki, falls in love with Shwetha (Shruthi Hariharan) working in  a pizza store. When Shankaranna and Nikki  are threatened by goons to hand over their theater for unpaid debts, in the dreamscape, there are extortionists who demand ransom from Nikki, the superstar and his manager (Achyuth Kumar). What follows is an intriguing set of events that pepper the parallel worlds building upto a collision of these seemingly parallel worlds which results in a surprising finale. 

In this fascinating juxtaposition of fantasy and reality, we find that even as the humble theater usher dreams of having the life of the superstar, the superstar himself, who is lapped up in luxury, dreams of leading a life filled with the struggles of a simpleton. There are also sub-plots in the form of a police investigation concerning a drug gang, Shwetha's futile attempts to make Nikki learn English such that he can work as an usher in a multiplex and Shankaranna's life-long ambition of releasing a Kannada movie he made years ago which found no takers.

Lucia has a complex and layered narrative and succeeds to a great extent in keeping the viewer interested and curious about the unfolding plot. It presents an intricate plot that is imaginative and cleverly inter-weaves the events in the real and dreamscapes so well that soon, the thin line separating the two planes disappears to intrigue the viewer. The plot brilliantly uses the fact of Nikki being colour blind to capture his dreams in in black and white while the real world is captured in colour. The closing sequences of the movie which melds both the parallel worlds is sure to stoke debates in the viewer. In its handling of the realm of dreams and probable dreams within dreams, there are definite streaks of Christoper Nolan (Inception).

Though the movie is billed as a psychological thriller, it also presents a simple romance between Nikki and Shwetha garnished with situational humour besides several sub-plots holding pointers to diverse elements including the crassness of commercial cinema with heavy reliance on item numbers, choppers, contemporary society's craze for everything Western, consumerism, the vanity with English, class differences, euthanasia and the travails of single screen cinemas which are an endangered species in the age of multiplexes. However, trying to cram in several such strands into the plot results to some amount of meandering of the narrative. This remains as a minor blemish, in an otherwise engrossing watch of about 135 minutes of its running time. 

Lucia is a pioneer on many fronts. It is the first ever Kannada (if not, the first South Indian) crowd-funded movie.  In less than a month, the 30-something director of Lucia, Pawan Kumar, could raise about Rs. 50 lakhs from more than 100 contributors through a Facebook page and his blog with an assurance to share the returns with all such contributors. Some 110 names popping up as associate producers as part of the opening credits is a sight to behold and is indeed heartening. It is also the first mainstream Kannada movie released with English subtitles. The story explores vistas hitherto considered the exclusive preserve of movies from Hollywood or some distant shores. Made on a paltry budget of about Rs. 75 lakhs, it stands tall among its well-endowed peers which present their at best prosaic fare as "hatke" entertainers. 

Nenasam Satish emotes well and has showcased a wide range of expressions convincingly. He shares an easy chemistry with the impeccable veteran Achyuth Kumar as well as Shruthi Hariharan who has ably supported him. The movie also greatly benefits from the background score of debutante music director Poornachandra Tejaswi who has also provided a few catchy tunes. Siddhart Nuni, the cinematographer (the movie is supposedly shot on a DSLR) shows his mastery in presenting a polished look for a movie made quite literally on a shoe-string budget.  

Whenever I watch movies like Inception and The Matrix, I, like many other desi fans, have wondered why such themes are never explored by Indian filmmakers. Lucia comes as a sight for sore eyes which have been yearning so long to find desi movies to explore such intriguing themes. It also shatters the multiple myths that nay-sayers propagate that Indian movies are constrained by budgets and our audience do not appreciate such experimental fare.

Lucia premiered in the London Indian Film Festival (LIFF) where it won the Audience Choice Award for the Best Film. With its unique story and a plot that is constructed around the world of movies and theaters, it is, indeed, a fitting tribute in this centenary year of Indian cinema. 

This brave venture of writer-director, Pawan Kumar is sure to win ample accolades of a wider audience of Kannada as well as non-Kannada cinephiles. 

Despite its flaws, Lucia remains a commendable experiment which intelligently engages the viewer and raises several pertinent questions in their mindspace. 

Take a bow, Pawan Kumar. I LOVED IT !! Your efforts are sure to inspire many more such meaningful experiments in Indian cinema.

A MUST WATCH !!