A Review of "Gharshana" - Telugu Movie

Gharshana - Technically Sound

I’ve finally managed to squeeze “Gharshana” into my schedule. Tuesday night show seemed so perfect for the outing. Apart from me, the balcony class of the theatre had ten people five of which are employees of the theatre.

I’ve seen the original “Kakka Kakka” umpteen times and so my review will be talking about both the versions.

I am not going to discuss the story-line of this movie. That is not the purpose of this review. (Check out Jeevi’s review on Idlebrain.) I am going to concentrate more on the other aspects of movie-making like Cinematography, Shot selection and editing. For this, I have to discuss some of the scenes in details. So there may be a couple of spoilers in here.

Gautham Menon, the man behind Minnale had come out with an instant winner in Gharshana/Kakka Kakka. The screenplay is crisp, fast and focused fully on the main theme. There are no unnecessary characters or songs in the movie. The mood of the movie does not encourage a comedy track and so the movie has a pretty serious tone throughout. Simple things such as keeping a scar on heroine’s face throughout the movie following her accident tell us how serious was Gautham about the script of the movie.

Technically it is brilliant. The concept of RFE – Rapid Fire Editing has been used throughout the movie. Anthony deserves a well rounded applause for his work on the Editing table. By the way, check out the song when they go to Nagarjuna Sagar for the first time. It is a real fine show of slick editing. As a matter of fact the Telugu version of this song has more punch than the Tamil version. (Purists: You are welcome to disagree with me. J)

Sandwiching of scenes (Two scenes interleaved) is also used in a very effective way. The next scene starts even before the current scene ends. The technique is used to smoothen the scene-changes. (The “click” in the viewer’s mind when a scene changes has to be minimized.) This is a common technique in Hollywood but Telugu movies have so far not explored this technique in a big way. With Gharshana it seems these techniques will be here to stay.

Gautham and Anthony have corrected a couple of screenplay/editing errors which stood out like soar thumbs in the Tamil version. The murder of a girl during “Aadathanama” song has been replaced with the murder of a police officer which makes more sense. However there is another screenplay blunder which crept into the Telugu version as well. In a well made movie which tries to be realistic at all times, the climax episode where the hero takes on the villain without the help of police force makes the movie come back to Tollywood from a Hollywood level. I thought Gautham would correct it in the Telugu version or at least provide an explanation on why the hero did not want anyone else to join him in his final attempt to nail the villain. Alas! It did not happen.

The other correction is the way Venkatesh catches the accomplice of the villain after the Zahirabad confrontation. In Kakka Kakka, the details are not shown and the Commissioner simply informs the hero that the accomplice had been caught. The Telugu version is more believable.

Coming to cinematography, it is top-notch. It is actually miles ahead of its Tamil counterpart. Gautham himself had admitted that with the restriction on budget gone, he could afford advanced techniques of cinematography. Blackening of the borders of the scene when something important happens in the movie adds to the effect excellently. It enhances the serious mood of the film beautifully. The director was careful enough not to overuse these techniques. So they blend in seamlessly.

Next comes the background talk. It started with Johnny and was perfected by Gharshana. If you concentrate mainly on what the focus actors are saying, you are going to miss the ambience talk. And this talk is part of the movie. It has some useful information as well. Also note that while the camera is focused on the lead actor/actress, the other actors in the background are not wooden. They go about doing their chores without paying any attention to the focus point of the camera. A scene that comes to my mind is when one of the cops is assassinated. Venkatesh is discussing it with the commissioner. In the background, the other police members discuss what should be done with the body and then carry out the tasks. The entire scene is in background. It adds a very natural look to the scene.

The movie is not without its negative points. I have already discussed one. There are a couple of scenes where the hero gets hit by a wooden log and the wooden log measuring at least ten centimeters in diameter breaks into bits and pieces. The hero’s hands are well intact though.

Don’t get me wrong here. Such scenes are common in Telugu movies. However if a movie is sensible enough to shy away from the cliché-ridden formula of Telugu movies, it can go that extra mile by not showing such absurd and unrealistic “image-enhancers”.

The final word: It is a masterpiece technically. However it may be a little too advanced for Telugu audience at this time.