Note: It may be not a review as I did not discuss about the performances and about the technical departments and the quality and richness of the movie. You may accept it or not. I just discussed about the concept. It was purely on the makers.
First of all who is a LEADER? What does he do? – In my opinion he is a person who rules or guides or inspires others and he should be a drawing card. Ok fine now coming to the latest movie Leader directed by Shekar Kammula starring Daggupati Rana ,Richa Gangopadhyaya ,Priya Anand, Suhasini and others. This movie has shown a character who is exotic in his style to be a Leader in fact a CM of a state. The film introduces Rana Daggupati to the silver screen and two other beautiful dames too. The movie has been released with a huge blatant promotion including some of the inspiring songs and some of the leaders from our past in the trailers. The film had claimed before release that it will inspire the people with a sublime emotion and it will show what and how a Leader should be and who a Leader is. But it entirely missed the track and the train had gone in a reverse direction. The leader in this movie and his ideas are just taken for granted and everything made us feel that “Shit this is just a Movie” and nothing else and the inspiring part is out of question. Then why to promote the film in a patriotic way?
Coming to the story line – The film starts with the CM being killed in a bomb attack and his last wish was to make his son as CM. His son Arjun Prasad returns from US (in one scene it is mentioned that he is the CEO of one of the fortune 500 company) and wants to fulfill his father’s wish. He is accompanied by Ali (Harshavardhan) and by a lady journalist (Priya Anand). They together form a plan and think on how to achieve this. From where they get the money and what they will do and what are the challenges they faced and how they overcome them and what the movie wanted to convey forms the rest of the film.
In my terms a Leader is who leads from the font, but what the film has portrayed that character certainly in a different way. Let’s talk about the film – In this movie CM has many appointments and much free time to spend his personal life. He goes for Jogging in the morning with his convoy and security running behind him. He goes on a date and he sings songs with his love and his partner dances with security accompanying her, he goes on an important assignment and in the middle they run out to the fields singing songs. His partner sits on the bonnet oh his convoy and the convoy moves forward. Agrrrrrr what am I seeing? The word CM has become a modal word in the whole movie everyone calls and uses this word and this word CM has lost its image (thanks that they have not used word – Chief Minister)
I accept some people saying that “He is also a Human being and he has his personal life too and that is what the director had shown. Ok I accept but what is the Title of the movie and the intention of this man coming into politics (in fact the film also should be taken into consideration). What is all this? If the director wants to show the chemistry between the Hero and Heroine no one has stopped him from imagination (Hero and Heroine can imagine a song as a duet – just both) but why the hell is the security accompanying them? How can any Security personnel allow to stop the convoy and go and sing songs and dance. They have their own duty.
Coming to real scenarios – A CM convoy will be accompanied by a Senior IPS officer and Z category security and once it starts it will stop only at the destination with some exceptions (definitely not for what I mentioned above). Come on man being Chief Minister is not a joke. Ok let’s talk in film terms – If you say this is a fictional film then it’s not – You are using a higher Authority of the state to portray what you wanna show. You should follow something (some protocols) when showing a defined position. Making research may have helped; this is where Hollywood captivates the originality of anything they show. Every movie needs a research on How, What, Why, when etc… The movie was concentrating on CM itself and forgot the word Leader. It was concentrating on how to achieve things – that’s it!!!
And coming to the character of CM need not have body language, he should have the Leadership qualities – but where did the character display these qualities. The director solely concentrated on just one theme – Corruption till the end of the movie. Is this the only problem and will the CM only think of this in his whole term? The director has taken everything for granted for this character.
The film started with a serious concept, it held tight and then the film loosens in the middle and tried to grip again but it already lost its grip on the plot, and now the audience were just watching Love story of a CM. Even some of the last sequences were good but they cannot help the movie.
Sorry if I got too logical with this film but the Title and the much created Hype made me feel like this.
About the performance Just want to mention Rana – He has done good has good screen presence but had to improve lot on his facial expressions (No emotions were seen when his father died and at some sequences in the second half).I did not find any need of two heroines in the movie. Priya Anand’s role was unnecessary and desolate. To understand most of this, watch the movie.
Coming to the good part of the movie – The hero was awesome and heroines are beautiful. Some sequences like – The slapping episode of MLAs son was very good, the turning back to Kota Srinivas Rao and dialogues there regarding the caste was good.
Bottom Line: – What is CM word used in this movie, if it is Chief Minister , then he has to change a lot and I may not want this kind of CM for my state. I want a REAL LEADER. But one thing Rana is HANDSOME. Go to watch him.
Dude… this is one of the best reviews i have ever read. every bit of your review made sense and literally is true. i wish to see you as a great review writer in the future
@Shravan: thanks dude for ur compliment , good to see at least some are mature enough of how films are made and also thinking of having some sense in the movie they are watching. Good to see these comments here.btw what are u doing these days?
i absolutely agree with you……there has been more hype for this movie than required…..i thought this would beat oke okkadu…but still oke okkadu stands top in case of movies regarding politics………
@watever: Nice to hear u say that, as some ppl are not accepting my points which i have put in there , but at least one person have the same thoughts as what i have….Oke Okkadu is out and out commercial film but this was publicized in a different manner. This has missed the track and is something but not an inspiring movie .
Oh i agree with each and every line you have written there…I don’t see why people are finding this movie to be soo inspiring.i spent freaking 16$ to watch this movie ..which is no good…did the director think that corruption is the only problem in our state..and the so called CM doesn’t seem to care about any thing else….the movie totally lost track in the middle…and why the hell did director choose to have two heroines??He could have totally eliminated the first one…and could have portrayed the second one in a better way..instead of making the hero betray her and all that stupid romantic stuff in front of security personnels…it would have been much better if she was his friend who joined hands with him to help him ave his power…and then later on he could show some chemistry while they were working and finally get them married…with out prolonging the stupid stuff and concentrating more on state and issues….All and all i didn,t expect this from shekar kammula….may be iam little bit harsh…but this is how disappointing i felt after i watched the movie…
@watever : Yep ,good comments though , i think u r too serious about the movie, but yes it is just the way u said and may be it should have been better as what u said…. One disappointing thing about movies are they cannot redeem ur $ if any movie is bad..LOL :-).Lets see if any other movie is made with credibility.
@ “The director solely concentrated on just one theme – Corruption till the end of the movie. Is this the only problem and will the CM only think of this in his whole term? The director has taken everything for granted for this character.”
Cinema is not an biography…Why can’t you assume that other aspects of the Chief Minister’s daily duties were not shown…. and who said Corruption is the only problem… What the Director tried to show was that cleansing the system starts at some point… And eradicating corruption by taking bold steps be the first thing on the young politician’s mind at that point….. He was also trying to inspire the youth to join politics…All this interwoven in a story to entertain the viewers.. Tough job!!
(Considering the fact that the movie comes with a social/political message) You could have tried to assess the success of the Director in getting his point across rather than boothadhamifying the flaws about subtle things in the movie that the director understandably overlooked while concentrating on a larger issue.
@Aditya: The problem with the Movie is its Title, at first place why is he called a Leader? You are saying that he inspired youth to come into politics, but did he really shoe that? where? He is the son of the CM so he had a chance, that is what is shown in the movie.
And why i did not mention the positive points ( there are many good ones in this movie) is the way the director has handled the story, One question – How can any sada seeda Journalist can get the mobile number of the CM? And when he wakes up next day he identifies that the girl in the book called him in the night — ah what is he showing? And CM calling the journalist to come with him and she is not caring – what has the director done to the character of the CM? it has just became a comedy. LOL i did not boothaddamify any thing dude…though good usage of the word