Naruda Donaruda Review, Sumanth Naruda Donaruda Movie Review Rating
It takes a lot to stage a comeback in Tollywood even if you belong to star family. Grit, planning and execution and lots of luck. Sumanth seems to have got it this time with “Naruda Donoruda” a fresh and uproarious remake of one of the most audacious and risqué theme films of Bollywood released in 2012 – Vicky Donor. The original film, directed by Shoojit Sircar became a sleeper hit in that year and managed to gross over Rs.100 crores. In ND, faithfully remade from the original, the film deals with the sensitive topic of infertility which affects over 1.5 per cent of India’s population and weaves a funny but plausible love story between an accidental sperm donor called Vicky and his lady love Ashima Roy and the pivotal role played by Tanikella Bharani (as Dr Anjaneyulu).
The story starts with Dr Anjaneyulu who is flooded with patients’ requests for sperm donation with higher effective sperm count. His team zero in on a youth called Vicky whose grandfather had nineteen children including four twins. Dr Anjaneyulu then focuses on enlisting Vicky for the job – he succeeds, both mint the money but that’s exactly when Vicky’s life takes a beautiful turn and then hits a roadblock. How he gets out of the mess is what the film is all about.
Typically, a risqué film like this should have got dumbed down and spruced up with native masala because Bengali sensibilities seldom mix and match with Telugu audience requirements. But director Mallik Ram gives mature treatment of the theme and blends it well to bring out the explosive humor and pathos at crucial points of the plot. Throughout the film, the undercurrent of sperm as a motif for male virulence runs in the film but the whole treatment is frivolous and loud – most dialogues are all about how to pun on the count of the sperm, falling fertility levels, and the struggles to get it “out”. Bollywood, over the years, has matured to take in this kind of comedy but whether Tollywood audiences have the wit to understand the pun in a dialogue like “No issues, if you just use the tissues!” is tough to find out and costly to know, from the producer’s point.
The issue is definitely serious and taboos need to be broken but whether the families watching it will take it in their stride or get shocked for the potshots the film takes on a serious lifestyle disease impacting the millions we will know. Tanikella Bharani as the doctor who commissions Vicky’s services as a sperm donor gets the role of a lifetime that will re-ignite his acting career. In a film like this, his role requires a looming presence even before the hero and the heroine make their entry and Tanikella fills the slot convincingly – from casualness to light-heartedness to disempathy to sympathizing to responsibility, he maneuvres the multiple emotions with punch and style. But the truth in reality is that no fertility patient will gift away more money and riches in gratis to the clinic with higher success ratio on fertility treatment, let alone gift bounties on a sperm donor. This is a ridiculous promise that the film puts in currency – that sperm donors can mint monies which career professsionals in IT and Finanace can’t make – and that’s silly. Besides, the film fails to address a basic issue – most fertility is all about politics of the womb. All struggles to get the baby out start and end with a woman’s reproductive organs – and there is not even a cursory mention about it. Since 2012, sperm donation has neither gone up nor fallen as per statistics, but surrogacy of the womb has shot up to dangerous levels that threaten the life and well-being of the females – a fact conveniently overlooked by the story adapted here. There are other issues of legitimacy, reputation risk, and clean habits of the male which have not been highlighted – but for the record, the hero is shown throughout the film as taking precautions to preserve and enhance the sperm count –he avoids hot beverages and smoking and mostly takes things cold.
In 132 minutes, the film concentrates only on the male vitality and makes a serious subject funny and flippant in the name of entertainment. Even if it stays with single-minded focus on this track, the film does entertain well with some class –more in the first half and less in the second half which needs closure. Good for Sumanth and the cast of Tanikella Bharani, newcomer Pallavi Subhash (Sumanth’s lover) and Srilakshmi (as Sumanth’s mother). Music by Sricharan stands out in few of the montage songs and BGMs. Dialogues are adapted well to nativities and the references to mythology about the ancient science of sperm donation to proliferate progeny is well-taken. In the end, Vicky’s sperm creates 53 healthy babies and there is a nice twist in the end which makes it a happy ending. Sumanth has done 21 films before this film – and deserves standout ovation for the boldness in choosing this theme.
In the mysterious ways of Tollywood, Sumanth has rejected scripts like “Athadu” (which went to Mahesh Babu) and “”Jalsaa” (which went to Pawan Kalyan) in his march to stardom. Despite all the bad luck, he shows his class and competence in the title role and remains in form and full command of acting caliber. For the Akkineni family, Sumanth served the transition of time before Naga Chaitanya and Akhil emerged on the screen. With this film, he proves he is still a chip off the old block and is back in reckoning with a good film, despite all the warts and gaps. Pallavi Subhash looks cute as his lady love. Cameo by Naga Chaitanya gives a good feeling in the end that this has the tacit approval of Nagarjuna. On the whole, this film takes an off-beat path to the content usually seen in Sumanth’s films which are family-oriented like “Godavari” and “Golconda High School”. From that point of view, the film is disappointing. If you have grown up children who know about the bees and the birds, take them or else please avoid as it may too embarrassing for you.
Telugu360 Rating 2.5/5
