Movie review 'Pilla Nuvvu Leni Jeevitham': Sai Dharam Tej’s romantic entertainer

Cast: Sai Dharam Tej, Jagapathi Babu, Regina, Prakash Raj, Sayaji Shinde and Raghu Babu

Director: AS Ravi Kumar Chowdhary

Rating: 3.5

After a long wait, Sai Dharam Tej, the new entrant from Chiranjeevi’s family, can now be seen on the silver screen in Tollywood. Although his first film ‘Rey’ did not release, his second film ‘Pilla Nuvvu Leni Jeevitham’ has released as his debut film. The film has been directed by AS Ravi Kumar Chowdhary and has Regina Cassandra playing the female lead. Senior actor Jagapathi Babu plays an important character in the film.

The story begins with two political leaders and aspiring Chief Ministers, Ganga Prasad (Sayaji Shinde) and Prabhakar (Prakash Raj) vying for the state’s top post. Then an investigative journalist Shafi (Shafi) runs a story on Ganga Prasad revealing leads about some scams. A contract killer, Maisamma (Jagapathi Babu) is assigned by a top police officer (Ahuti Prasad) to kill the journalist Shafi. Meanwhile, Srinu (Sai Dharam Tej), a college student, meets Maisamma and asks him to kill a person, however Maisamma doesn’t agree. Srinu then narrates his story to convince Maisamma. A romance runs on a parallel track with Srinu falling in love with a girl Siri (Regina) who does not reciprocate his feelings. Srinu however persists and also happens to find out that some people want to kill her. Why they want to kill her, what is her background, how Srinu saves her and wins her heart is the crux of the story. Of course there are quite a few twists and turns in the story to keep the audience engaged.

Director AS Ravi Kumar Chowdhary is directing a film after a hiatus and has done a good job. The film is a nice romantic entertainer with good screenplay. It is very evident that this is a complete director’s film from the way the screenplay delivers loads of entertainment.

The story turns interesting when Sai Dharam Tej meets Maisamma and starts narrating his story. Though told in flashback, the story has been narrated by the director at an interesting pace.

This is a perfect film for a new face like Sai Dharam Tej. His experience with his first film ‘Rey’ might have helped him deliver the mature performance that he has given in this film. Throughout the film he shows ease in his acting and high levels of confidence. His good height is an advantage too. One can see his hard work in the dance and action scenes. He entertains throughout the film with his performance and he has done this quite comfortably. Generally actors from Chiranjeevi’s family, imitate either Chiru or Pawan Kalyan, however Sai Dharam Tej has not shown any of those typical mannerisms, which is a good thing. Regina looks beautiful and she has played her part perfectly, yet again proving that she is one of Tollywood’s highly talented actresses.

Jagapathi Babu, who after ‘Legend’ turned to character roles, has played his character with ease. Actually he is the main pillar of the film. Prakash Raj and Sayaji Shinde have characters that are usual for them and they have played their parts with their usual finesse. Raghu Babu’s comic histrionics are good and sure to enthral the audience. Shafi, Satya, JP and Chandra Mohan have provided a few laughs too.

Anup Rubens has been composing excellent music for a while now and has done the same for this film too. The dialogues, written by Diamond Ratnam are good and there are no lengthy dialogues in the film. The cinematography is also good.

While the film does have a few drawbacks, it is perfect for Sai Dharam Tej. Full credit goes to the director for handling the film well and it is expected that the film will give a good break to the director and also to Sai Dharam Tej.

Another young promising actor from a big film family has arrived with a bang. Ram Charan, Allu Arjun and others have competition!