Hello Guru Prema Kosame - Movie Review

What’s it about!

Sanju (Ram) moves to Hyderabad from Kakinada to do a job in a software company. His mother (Sithara) asks him to stay at her friend’s house. Her friend is Vishwanatham (Prakash Raj), a middleclass guy with a daughter Anupama (Anupama) who is studying engineering. Sanju likes her at the very first moment when he sees her in a train journey from Kakinada to Hyderabad but their friendship begins on a misunderstanding note. At his office, he falls for the beauty of his colleague Ritu (Pranitha) but his heart still beats for Anupama. Will he win Anupama? Why does Vishwanatham agree to Sanju’s 30-days challenge?

Analysis

Director Trinadha Rao Nakkina and his writer Prasanna Kumar have created a story template of their own with films like ‘Cinema Choopista Maava’ and ‘Nenu Local’ where in the protagonist tries to get upper hand over his girlfriend’s father who is creating trouble to their love story. In ‘Cinema Choopista Maava’, it was Raj Tarun and Rao Ramesh’s “Tu Tu Main Main” thread. In ‘Nenu Local’, Nani throws a challenge to Sachin Khadekar that he’d make his daughter fall in love with him in no time and Sachin tries all sort of tricks to stop him.

With little variation here and there and some new additions, they are telling the same story again and again. “Hello Guru Prema Kosame” is no different either. In this, Prakash Raj agrees to be Ram’s best friend but he also has to see that his daughter should not fall for Ram. He uses many tricks to stop him. Here they have created a 30-days friendship angle to Prakash Raj to add some novelty factor to the plot. There is also ‘Nuvvu Naku Nachavu’ angle to this story - Prakash Raj and Sithara are best friends much like Prakash Raj and Chandramohan in ‘Nuvvu Naku Nachavu’ and Anupama’s later portions remind us Venkatesh’s characterization.

Despite familiar story, the film provides good comedy in the first half. The most hilarious moment is when Ram accidentally landing in Pranitha’s home that leads to major confusion among the characters which is totally LOL stuff. The comedy track in software company also brings some laughs. Even after interval, we get to see some fun moments between Prakash Raj and Ram especially during the restaurant scene. However, it turns too predictable after a point and it drags on and on.

Moreover, the romantic track on Ram and Anupama is totally plain. It is not clear why they actually fall in love with each other? Is it because they are the lead pair of the movie? The revelation of Anupama looks so contrived. The ending is too clichéd. Second half totally reeks of lousy writing.  

Ram has shown his mark in portraying this easy role. There is nothing special to his performance to talk about but he makes many dull scenes livelier. His comic timing works well. Prakash Raj as Ram’s “unusual friend” is major asset to this regular drama. He gets lengthy role and the senior actor owns it. Anuapama has played cute and naïve middle class girl’s role neatly. Pranitha appears in brief period but she looks beautiful. Sithara and Praveen make some impression in other roles.

Songs by Devi Sri Prasad are pretty average. The music director has composed in his typical trademark style, yet two songs are catchy. Comedy scenes written by Bejawada Prasanna Kumar have worked in some places and in some scenes they sound odd. Cinematography by Vijay C Chakrvarthy of ‘Bommarillu’ fame has shown his mark in making the movie look colorful, the film is mostly shot indoors.

Director Trinadha Rao Nakkina shown his command in the first half.

Bottom-line: With a regular plot line and formulaic scenes, ‘Hello Guru Prema Kosame’ offers nothing much beyond some hilarious moments. What really works in the film is first half of the movie as it provides some neat comedy. Rest is routine and predictable.