Dear Comrade, Vijay Deverakonda Shines In Gem Of A Film

Dear  Comrade(Telugu)

Starring Vijay Deverakonda, Rashmika Mandanna

Directed by Bharat Kamma

Rating: **** ½ (4 and a half stars)

The pre- and  post-interval  halves  of  the new  Vijay Deverakonda  starrer   Dear  Comrade  are like two different  films. And  that’s  not a bad thing at all. Not in  this case.For,  what the  schizophrenic saga tells us about human nature and its gamboling shifts of perspective is far  more valuable than the concept of  consistency that we seek in art and seldom find in real life.

 The  first half  of  Dear Comrade  builds  on Deverekonda’s Arjun Reddy image  of  a young hotblooded  man in serious  need  of anger management. Unlike Arjun,  Bobby  in  this film is a rebel with a cause. The  director  creates a believable construct  of  an impending destruction that comes to those who care too much  about what  goes  in  the world to  notice that their own life is coming undone.

Deverekonda  who has  grown into one of the most likable star-actors of the country  takes  us through  Bobby’s romantic journey with  Lily (Rashmika Mandanna , natural and likeable though a little too eager to emote at times) . His  eyes  body-language and even  his amazingly evolved dancing skills  convey a wealth  of  love and  devotion, so that when the girl tells him to back off at a family wedding(the venue of so  many heartbreaks in Indian cinema) we feel  Bobby’s hurt jump at us out of thescreen  with palpable urgency.

Deverakonda’s  performance is filled with  surprising  intensity and warmth. He is  never afraid  to show  his emotions in an unvarnished condition. The music and songs by  Justin  Prabhakaran  make telling use  of classical elements to  create  an  aura of  raga-soaked romance. In  the  first-half  the  romance perched at  a perfect pitch.

 The  ecstasy of  love dissolves in the second-half when  the film wants to tell another  story. The switchover to  a plotline on sexual harassment , where Bobby’s anger  is directed at a social system that encourages women to stay silent when violated,   shows a  selfassured  shift of perspective brought  on by  the conviction that  in life and in a relationship, commitment is  not only  personal issue.

There are  moments  between  the couple that are  at once heartwrenching and  edifying. The narrative keeps the central relationship from slipping off from the credible zone even as  the  emotions  go from real and raw  to curiously unbelievable to the stylishly  filmy.]

 Through all the ordeals  by fire that the  lovers go through  the  film captures the impassioned  intensity  of the Bobby-Lily  reckless affinity.To just see this  couple in love is  to feel  the  impact  of  love.