[Movie Review] Drushyam

Language: Telugu
Cast         : Venkatesh, Meena, Nadia, Naresh, Kritika etc.
Director  :  Sripriya

Drushyam is a remake of Malayalam super hit movie "Drishyam", which garnered great popularity for its unconventional story. This one comes in a surprise new genre – Family Thriller, as the movie tries to capture different family emotions simultaneously to narrating a suspense thriller and it does not fail to impress you in both ways.

It is story of Rambabu (Venkatesh), a cable TV owner in a small village who lives a family life with his wife and two daughters. His obsession of life is watching films and he not only watches movies of different languages and genres but also uses the knowledge obtained from films to resolve real life issues. This way he becomes a man loved by all people around, and in the process earns hostility of a corrupt police constable, a subtle role played by Ravi Kale ferociously. In his normal life comes a sudden turn with which the entire world around him turns upside down and his family is in danger. What will he do to save themselves, what will happen to him and why the Inspector General(IG) Geetha, played by Nadhiya, is after their family forms the rest of the story.

The movie opens up with usual comedy and family scenes as director seems to have taken time to start telling the story. It gains pace in first half slowly and reaches an interesting point by interval but the real edge of the seat narration with perfectly carved out screenplay is found in second half which stumps the audience. It is rare to witness an intellectual movie in Telugu, that too with a star hero playing the lead, this one does come as a surprise with convincing twists and turns, all credit to Jeethu Joseph for a taut script and gripping screenplay.

The choice of actors are also seemed very apt, with Venkatesh, after some recent slowdown in career, comes with a stunning performance, as family dramas are his favourite repertoire, here he mixes his emotions well as a protective father and a man on a mission. Meena comes back to big screen in Telugu after long gap and fits in well as a middle class mother and kritika who played the role of daughter makes a good screen presence and impresses with her expressive eyes which speaks all. Director Sripriya has incorporated all spices well to impress not just the family audience but everyone else too, as she ensured each detail be well explained sans the mass audience be left out, however first half an hour of the movie could have been better than what has been tried by the director. Songs are well placed, the background sometimes gets too loud but the screenplay and some good acting by leading actors saves the day.

All in all, it is a wonderful entertainer which will test your ability to think what’s next and keeps you hooked till the end. Hope with such a movie, Telugu industry may get a new wave of new story telling which does not depend on heroism and routine tamasha but makes the story Hero of the movie.

Rating : 4/5

Bottomline: If you enjoy suspense thrillers then a must watch for you and for others it is certainly more than just a “One time Watch”.

Unforgettable Love

“What do you think? Will she like it?” he asked showing the sari.

She was furious now that he was asking the same question for hundredth time and sadly he may not even realise it. She controlled her emotions and just nodded saying nothing.

It was getting late and she was eagerly waiting for her husband to come home, sometimes she felt her husband needs to care more about his family than country alone, he is always busy in office and even at home he discusses only about problems of society. It is not that she doesn’t like him but she missed that attention and love which a wife yearns for from her husband. She always had a dream that one day he will come home running and with love lifts her in his arms, start kissing….

“How about some roses along with the Sari?”, again asked the old man, suddenly, disturbing her dream.

She remained silent, looking away from him. He asked again, “When is she coming? I have to be ready to surprise her.”

She hesitantly said, “She is not coming father. You should go to bed now, it’s too late”, and accompanied him to his room.

“Why is she not coming? Does she still think I’m a boring man? May be I’m really boring, that is why no one loves me” he said gloomily.

“You should not worry yourself father, we all love you so much. Here, take these medicines and rest. Have a good night”, saying she made him take the pills and left the room after he was lying on bed.

After an hour her husband returned home. He was having dinner silently, as always, “So, how was your day?” she broke the silence.

“Pathetic. The government is not supporting us to address any issue while people have long before lost their confidence in government. Don’t know where this nation will lead to”

She understood where this conversation was going so thought it better not to ask more questions.

“How was your day at home? Hope dad has not troubled you much” he asked.

“Not at all, except that he keeps on asking about your mom and I find it very difficult to explain every time, as he forgets this one thing of all so quickly. Today he thought it is her birthday and wanted to give her a surprise gift.”

“Oh! You know once mom became very angry when he forgot her birthday and that day he promised to surprise her on every occasion from then.” He said with a smile, paused for a moment before saying, “he misses her so much now”, she could sense the pain in his words.

“She must have been a lovely woman” she said


“Of course she was. That is why God has taken her away so soon”, he left the table immediately to wash his hands, avoiding eye contact with her but she sensed his eyes were moist with tears.

She cleared the table and went to bed room. Her husband was not there while there was something on the bed. A small bouquet of roses, her favorite Dairy Milk Silk chocolate and a greeting card, there were butterflies flying in her stomach as she was opening it.

She opened it to see what's written inside..

She could hear his footsteps approaching her; she stood in shocked silence, also ecstatic for she knew her dream will come true now.

Despicably dipsomaniac

Recently I was with few friends at a tea point when we overheard a couple talking, the girl asked the guy why he smokes so many cigarettes every day and his reply was overwhelming.

“What’s there in life if there is no cigarette, alcohol and women?”

I do not know about the girl sitting with him but I was literally shaken to hear that there is nothing in life beyond the three things he mentioned. For the moment let’s forget about the last thing and talk about the first two things in the list. 

Smoking is a habit, good or bad, taken up by youth as a style quotient and according to some surveys the average age group when people are starting to smoke is 14-16 years. From such tender age they smoke few cigarettes a day and this FEW will keep on increasing in number incrementally going to few number of packets a day and in extreme cases also resorting to drugs like marijuana. It is undeniably true that people smoking are spoiling not only their lungs but also of the people around them, women and children usually being most vulnerable. This is my trump card I’d play, when people argue that I oppose it as I have never taken a puff, to say that Cigarette has only worse things associated with it and have to be shunned.

Legally speaking, some countries like Norway have totally banned smoking in public places including bars and restaurants, while in other countries like India we have a ban on “Smoking in public places” but the implementation of the law is not so impressive. According to WHO (World Health Organization) estimates tobacco killed 100 million persons in 20th century, more than the two world wars combined and this war against tobacco is going on without much success to its credit.

Next in the list is alcohol which any layman can say is the most popular drink among present youth (to larger extent among men) in the world, surprisingly even in arid and semi-arid regions of India too this liquid flows so incessantly that I wonder what makes people so much captivated to it. Some regions boast some unique features and events in this regards, like in Chennai people decently follow a long queue in front of the liquor shops every evening to buy liquor, in certain towns of Andhra Pradesh there were protests organised by local men demanding more liquor shops be opened in their localities (one needs a licence to open a liquor shop in India), in weddings of Punjab and few other states more whisky flows than water and last but not least, in Tamilnadu the state run TASMAC shops selling alcohol continue to be a major source of income for the state exchequer.

A liquor shop scene in Chennai.

The non-teetotallers argue that, unlike smoking, drinking alcohol is not harmful to the people around and also there are medical proofs that limited intake of alcohol has some good effect on health. FAIR point. Also the government is getting large revenue which it can utilise for the betterment of the society certainly but what upsets me most is that this revenue is generated because several poor men are spending large part of their income on alcohol consumption which is pulling their families back into sheer poverty. In a country like India where millions of people find it hard to make their ends meet, to what extent is it fair on the part of government to make people prone to alcoholic addiction.

Now in case of middle class and rich class lads who find no trouble to spend a few thousands for parties with friends and ENJOY smoking and drinking, I would say government can hardly be blamed. In fact here even the alcoholics are not to be blamed but pitied with, because they are the spenders & sufferers too and at the end of the day what they get is nothing but hangover.

Let me explain, the guys and girls enjoy PARTY with friends, send few pegs down the throat and after being high they dance, scream, fight, beat & do several things which in normal circumstances they will never do as they are usually very timid and blame the alcohol for all their stupid acts done. The ice on the cake is, they don’t remember anything done while the teetotallers make fun of all the silly drama unfolded by alcoholics. Now who has more entertainment here? So if any of your friends are also turning too much to alcohol, please help them to face the world without any fears and make them more confident so that they can do all they want to without asking alcohol to do it.

Life is fun I agree, but it should not be at the cost of life itself…