Tenali Ramakrishna Movie Reviews

A straight lift from Tamil film Kadhanayagan this comedy flick is good in parts. The first half is very entertaining with Ramesh and Jaggesh taking everything on their shoulders and doing a good job. The emergence of sentiment and lack of crispness on the part of the director makes it lengthy. Nearly half an hour the film could have been pruned. While doing justice to the original script the director Magadi Pandu with three hits to his credit could have given gate pass to routine scenes. For example the shooting scene, Thenali and Rama going to borrow kerosene and rice in the heroines place etc. While making remake the requirement of present day and what audiences like, where the film drags should have been carefully worked out.

The misconception element and loyalty of Thenali and Rama give them good position in the end. But what happens before that is interesting in the first half. It is packed with good humor and timing of two senior actors Ramesh and Jaggesh who tickle your funny bones.

Thenali (Ramesh) €“ B.com first class and Rama (Jaggesh) SSLC are jobless. They are day dreamers. They are drawn to the feeling that they can make hell lot of money in Dubai and settle in life. Thenali intending to cure his ailing mother and Rama helping him decide to take bank loan. They pay a cheat the loan amount and lands in Goa instead of Dubai. It is at this place they are in the disguise of Dubai costume a suitcase accidentally reach their hands. To their surprise it is the drugs containing suitcase that they hand over to Goa police. Hopeless situation for Thenali and Rama is avoided by one of their villager living there. Both are taken to a place for employment. It happens to be the place of drug peddler. Although they work there the two handed over suitcase containing drugs to Thenali Rama mistake them as CID's. Thenali and Rama are shunted out of job. An attempt to finish off Thenali and Rama fails miserably from Chota Raman schemes. Their vibrant attitude sends the goons who are looking for the colony to construct a building of their choice. Wherever these two reach they are mistaken by drugs smugglers as CID's. In the final bout Thenali and Rama are attacked political chelas and drug smugglers together. They use their muscle and brain power to weed out the goons. The police in the end reward Thenali and Rama with a job for their sincerity.

Ramesh and Jaggesh both 100 plus films to their credit have given splendid treat in the first half. The second half gradually shift to sentiment and loses novelty. Rangayana Raghu is another funny bone tickler in this film. Deepu, Madhuri and Santoshi are OK. The senior comedy artistes of Kannada cinema have made a brief presence. Patnayak fails to impress with melodious songs. He has given the routine music with no creativity. Ananaji Nagaraj has not taken care in his camera work. The outdoor shoot he has done is not pleasant on the screen.

This is a first class comedy in the first half.