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Anaganaga Oka Raju Movie Review

Cast: Naveen Polishetty, Meenakshi Chaudhary, Rao Ramesh, Tarak Ponappa, Chammak Chandra, Saanve Megghana


Crew:

Written by Naveen Polishetty, Chinmay, Maari
Cinematography by J. Yuvraj
Music by Mickey J. Meyer
Editing by Vamsi Atluri
Directed by Maari
Produced by Naga Vamsi, Sai Soujanya


Naveen Polishetty has a built a brand for himself with Jathi Ratnalu while all his three films - Agent Sai Sreenivas Athreya and Miss Shetty Mister Polishetty have also become super hits. With Anaganaga Oka Raju, Naveen is entering into a commerical movie format and aiming for an illustrious Sankranti grosser for festival. The movie released today on 14th January, and let's discuss about it in detail.


Plot:

Raju (Naveen Polishetty) is a rich Zamindar's grandson but his grand father spent all of their riches on different ladies and women. Raju hopes to marry a rich girl and lead a life in style like his name. He further gets humiliated by his relatives and he decides to marry a girl from rich family, who is only daughter and has more than 100 crores in asset value. He decides to marry Charulatha (Meenakshi Chaudhary) as she satisfies all his conditions.


He starts Operation Charulatha to woo her and finally, succeeds in getting her and her father (Rao Ramesh)'s acceptance for their marriage. After getting married, he gets to know that his father-in-law doesn't have any assets left but only loans. He needs to clear the mess and save at least their house. So, he decides to join politics and become President against Erri Babu (Tarak Ponappa). He doesn't have money to give surety and security deposit for nomination too. Can he win? What will he do? Watch the movie to know more.


Analysis:

Naveen Polishetty has emerged as a potential star hero with three back to back successes which doesn't belong to only one genre but every film had entertaining comedy at the core. So, the actor has tried for the first time a complete character driven comedy with Anaganaga Oka Raju. He even sung in this film and written it. He took 4 years due to various reasons to finally, release it as well. The effort shows in his performance as well.


His one-liners in the second half, mainly, satires on political system work but in the first half, he did not seem to be fit in "regular troupes" of Telugu Cinema. He tried the slow-motion walk shots, fights and scenes that are normally seen as "celebration of stars". They did not seem to suit him as his body language and his style did not fit to such troupes. He did put in his maximum efforts and did his best.


The Operation Charulatha episodes and Election Campaign episodes worked better as they suit him more. There have been many logical loop holes across the narrative and the makers seem to have not care. Music from Mickey J Mayer is underwhelming but Bheemavaram Balma did work to some extent. Meenakshi Chaudhary looked good and her performance is decent. Rao Ramesh, Tarak Ponappa, Chammak Chandra did give their best but have been pushed to back burner throughout.


The movie brings back Kanti Kantharao, Attili Sattibabu LKG kind of Allari Naresh and EVV films to mind while Aa Okkati Adakku seems to also been a major inspiration behind it. While the inspiration is visible and effort is also appreciable, the writing did not really land the punches consistently like those films. Technically, Production values are good, cinematography and editing could have been better. Overall, one character based drama did cost the movie as the conflict did not come across strongly as much as it should have.


Bottomline:

Naveen Polishetty tries an all-in single character entertainer which works to some extent.


Rating: 2.75/5


Disclaimer: The views/opinions expressed in this review are personal views/opinions shared by the writer and organisation does not hold a liability to them. Viewers' discretion is advised before reacting to them.