Film: Damarukam (Telugu)
Director: Srinivasa Reddy
Cast: Akkineni Nagarjuna, Anushka Shetty and Ganesh Venakataraman
Rating: **1/2
Damarukam is a lot of what you expect it to be, much more of what you won’t really expect the movie to be and a whole lot of randomness that just gets thrown in. This is one of those ‘mass’ movies that you should go and watch if you’re really bored, just beware of the overt religiously inclined content.
This is a movie for any lover of Lord Shiva and Tollywood ‘King’ Nagarjuna, who, while staying true to his ‘mass’ character, manages to weave a palpable story of a deity who comes down to earth to set things right for a devotee who has stopped believing.
As with most fantasy and spiritual-themed Tollywood productions these days, the film is replete with visual effects that are at times fabulous and at other times, outright funny. Some of them manage, however, to create a sense of awe and amazement, with a slightly disheartening feeling of — hey, I’ve seen this before.
Anushka Shetty has been underutilised severely in this movie and we have a problem with that. Considering she is the real icon for this genre of movies (think Arundhati and Panchakshari), it’s sad that Akkineni Nagarjuna wove the whole script around his divine connection and the madness that ensues.
The comedy track, that runs parallel to the film is haphazard (not surprising) and does not manage to elicit even a snigger quite often. Plastic supporting characters also do not add to this bewilderment of — why are there so many people on screen who have nothing to do really? We do not kid you when we say that there are several characters in the film who do not spout a single dialogue through the film’s entire length.
What the film can be credited for is a rediscovery of the done-to-death obsession with aghoris in Telugu cinema. The new perspective and insights that the film offer into this community’s controversial lives, are in much better taste than many of similar-genre films that preceded Damarukam.
Watch Damarukam for a wonderful tale of people who love Lord Shiva in all his brilliance and hence also look out for a wonderfully choreographed aghori piece towards the end.
The rest of the songs are insanely boring and really, you should pace your popcorn and restroom breaks as they start — you’ll be back just before they end and we promise you wouldn’t have missed a thing.
Watch it for some good timepass, but please don’t expect anything! And just in case you were wondering, the film has nothing to do with Amish’s Meluha series.
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