<i>Yogi</i> Review

Tuesday, January 16, 2007
Vinayak's changes typical style

Dynamic director VV Vinayak is known for films with lot of action and Yogi is no exception to it. Basically it is the remake of a Kannada hit film Jogi and has mother sentiment in its backdrop. The action drama was mixed to elevate the heroism of the hero. Though Vinayak is known for a gripping screenplay and perfect direction, he failed to reach the expectations of his fans with not so good narration. Possibly he tried to follow the original film and pushed back his own screenplay. However, Prabhas did justice to his role because it is not a novel role and has action backdrop.

Eswara Prasad (Prabhas) is the son of Kolatam Rammurthy (Chalapati Rao) and Santamma (Sarada). Rammurthy doesn't want to see his son to play kolatam as it could not earn enough money for a happy living. He wants his son to do some job. However, Santamma pampers Prasad very much and hence he doesn't want to leave the village. Rammurthy dies and in order to fulfil his last wish, Prasad goes to the city to earn money on the advice of his friend Basha (Ali), who was a pickpocket. Prasad could not meet Basha. On the other hand Kotaiah (Kota Srinivasa Rao) runs big land mafia in Hyderabad city and a bitter rival of Narsing Pahilwan (Pradeep Rawat). Saidulu (Subbaraju) is Narsing's brother. Once Saidulu hacks Kotaiah and his assistant, when Prasad accidentally saves him. Prasad gets a job in a tea stall run by Chandranna (Chandramohan). He earns good money and purchases two gold bangles for his mother and plans to leave the city. At this juncture, Narsing humiliates Prasad for saving Kotaiah and stamps the gold bangles of his mother. Irked over this, Prasad kills Narsing in broad day light. As a result, he turns the biggest goon of the city. Meanwhile, Santamma reaches Hyderabad city to search for her son and takes shelter with Nandini (Nayanatara), a journalism student. In order to save him from the police, Chandranna takes him out saying that his name is Yogi. Learning that Yogi killed Narsing, Kotaiah wants Yogi to join him, but to no avail. Chandranna encourages Prasad who turned Yogi to stay back in the city to save the poor, who gets harassed by the goons. Yogi remains a terror for the goons. So, Kotaiah and Saidulu join hands and hatch a plan to kill Yogi. In the process Saidulu gets killed by Yogi. Nandini is also after Yogi for an interview to complete her practicals. Somehow, she falls in love with him. Though Yogi and Santamma lives in the same city they could not meet each other. One day, Yogi meets Basha, who reveals that he saw Santamma. Though Basha and Santamma go to the address, they could not find him as Prasad is known as Yogi for the people. Santamma waits for her son in front of a temple, as Basha tells her that Prasad is in the habit of visiting the temple on every Monday. But Prasad did not turn up on Monday fearing attack by Saidulu's people. Santamma dies in front of the temple and Basha arranges funeral for her. At this time Yogi comes but fails to have a look at the covered face and helps the orphan body lifters with money for cremation and he even bring flowers and puts on the body of his mother. Yogi is unaware that the body is of his mother's body until it is moved to fire cabin. Basha finally arrives and explains the trauma but it is too late. He realizes the truth only after Nandini shows the belongings of his mother, who came to see him. The film ends with the tragedy as Yogi fails to see his mother again after he comes from his village.

Plus:
Prabhas performance is a highlight in the film. He did the fights with extreme ease. Especially his six-foot tall body, macho-man image, full toned body helped him to suit the image. Nayanatara, though restricted for a glamour role and to shake legs with the hero, is another added attraction. Another major attraction in the film is the performance of Subbaraju. The action choreography by fight master Vijayan and the cinematography by Sameer Reddy are the other major plus points to be mentioned.

Minus:
It is not known why director chose a number of villains for the film. He must have followed the original as it is instead of reworking on it. Rajan P Dev's character is a waste and the director also failed to elevate the villainy in Pradeep Rawat. Kota Srinivasa Rao though showed villainy in words, his character was not properly established. Even the love story between the hero and heroine was not properly shown. It looked that Director Vinayak imitated the dance scene of mother and son duo from Style. Vinayak's style of taking is totally missing in the film.

Remarks:
The action scenes in the films were choreographed wonderfully, while the songs are just okay. However, the comedy track in the film is quite hilarious. Especially Venumadhav's character and the Aparichitudu kind of comedy by Sunil is quite enthralling and evoked huge laughter from the audiences in the theatre. As a whole the film remained an average flick and may not give any competition to Desamuduru or its earlier release Annavaram.

Cast : Prabhas, Nayanatara, Sarada, Kota Srinivasa Rao, Pradeep Rawat, Subbaraju, Ali, Venumadhav, Sunil, Chandramohan, Chalapati Rao, Rajan P Dev, MS Narayana, Prasannakumar, Uttej, Melkote and others.

Credits :
Story - Prem
Dialogues - Rajendrakumar
Cinematography - Sameer Reddy
Editing - Gouthamraju
Action - Stun Siva
Music - Ramana Gogula
Re-recording - Gurukiran
Presents - Ravindranath Reddy
Producers - P Chandrapratapa Reddy and P Sudarshan Reddy
screenplay and direction - VV Vinayak.

Banner : Eswari Films Pvt Ltd.,

Released on : January 14, 2007

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