Film: Shyam Singha Roy
Rating: 2.75/5
Cast: Nani, Sai Pallavi, Kriti Shetty, Sivanarayana, Subhalekha Sudhakar, Murali Sharma etc
Music: Mickey J Meyer
Cinematography: Sanu John Varghese
Editing: Naveen Nooli
Producer: Venkat Boyinapalli
Director: Rahul Sankrityan
Release Date: 24 December 2021
"Shyam Singha Roy" is the film that has been gripping the attention of audience right from its title to the get up of Nani and its trailer. The expectations are piled up towards the release of the film.
Let's see how it goes on.
Story:
Vasudev Ghanta (Nani) is a short film maker. He is in the quest of a female lead for his short film. After a series of failed auditions, finally he finds a girl (Krithi Shetty) in a coffee shop. He chases her and at last makes her his heroine. During the shoot, a group of men harass her. Vasudev fights with them and rescues her.
But since then he keeps on passing out for a few seconds and his other self gets activated. After a series of such episodes finally he gets arrested on the charges of plagiarizing the stories from Bengali novels published 50 years ago and selling them to film producers.
But Vasudev pleads not guilty and successfully passes the lie detector test as well. Who is Vasudev? What's his connection to Shyam Singha Roy? Who is Shyam Singha Roy? What happens next is the story.
Artistes' Performance:
Nani gave an excellent performance in dual role. While he looked so routine as Vasudev, his portrayal as Shyam Singha Roy is impeccable. He perfectly suited in the role of a Bengali guy. The way he delivered a few Bengali dialogues also sound impressive.
Sai Pallavi as Maithreyi is good. Her dancing skills are not explored much this time. It is so common for the audience to expect out of the box dance moves from her after 'Love Story'. But nothing of that sort worked.
Krithi Shetty's role is very limited. She makes her presence felt to some extent in the first half, but was completely sidelined later.
Madonna Sabastian has done her part well. Jishu Sen Gupta and Bhupal Raju have very small roles to play. Rahul Ravindran has some important part to portray.
Murali Sharma as prosecutor and Subhalekha Sudhakar as the Justice are fine. Rest all fit well in their roles.
Technical Excellence:
The songs are not so haunting but the background score is good.
Cinematography is excellent and the brownie points go to Art Department for re-creating the 1970's Bengal.
Editing can be crispier in the second half.
Dialogues are ok but can be far better. Had the character of Shyam Singha Roy been etched with better attention, the dialogues also would have gone to the next level.
Highlights:
Nani as Shyam Singha Roy
Sai Pallvi as Maithreyi
Background Score
Cinematography
Art Work
Drawbacks:
Second half
Predictable climax
Beaten rebirth story
Analysis:
The first half of the film is very promising. The pre interval episode and the interval bang are good. But the film ends predictably on the lines of "Devadasu Malle Puttaadu".
We can call this an outdated storyline with modern style of narration. The modernity is shown in technical expertise but the emotional strings of the audience are not touched at all. The conflict part is good but the climax episode became too flat to imagine.
Moreover, the attempts to justify rebirth concept in the court by defense lawyer cannot be taken for granted by all sets of audience and this affects the receptive mood. This may appeal to those who believe in but sounds repugnant for the rest.
The films based on rebirth concept were many in Indian film industry but they were successful only when dealt with proper emotional graph than logic.
The biggest problem in this story is that the protagonist has no villain to fight from the past birth. He punishes the main culprit Mohanty in the past life itself. So, there is no revenge path to deal with in the next life.
Besides, the reformist characterization of Shyam Singha Roy is also half baked. He was shown going against the untouchability and caste system of 1970s. In the later part Maitreyi mentions about the Devdasi system in other temples in India and hints to emancipate the women from those shackles. But that was left without giving any impetus and covered up in the montage song.
The pace of the film is marred after the beginning of second half where the love track between Shyam and Maitreyi starts. It goes on very slow with the supers like 'modati raatri'...to 'thommidava raatri'.
The mood of the audience is set by the interval to watch the powerful characterization of Shyam Singha Roy. But that wasn't delivered properly.
The problem is with the story than anything else. This is clearly inspired from Deavdasu Malli Puttaadu and those who watched that film can easily identify with the climax.
To an extent, it should be appreciated that the character of Kriti Shetty is not grooved into this rebirth track.
All in all, "Shyam Singha Roy" is something that looks different on the posters but not on the screen. The efforts can be appreciated but the purpose is not served as expected.
Bottom Line: Devadasu Malli Puttaadu