Speaking about performances, Rajendra Prasad is sincere in his effort though his make-up could have been a little different and better. He is convincing as a caring father. Child actor Sara Arjun innocence reaches out to you. She uses her eyes very well to convey her genuine charisma. And yes, it her performance that keep you hooked through. Another child actor, who wants to be called Sunny, but is always called Sanyasi Raju. He failed in his attempt to gel well with the nativity of his grandfather’s bestow upto the humour department. Nithya Shetty and Siddharth Varma are truly natural, but they haven’t got much to do in it. Sandhya Janak delivers what was expected from her as Raju’s wife. Ravi Prakash, Balu, Sree Harsha and Prabhu acted well in their limited characterizations.
The film is a remake of director A L Vijay’s Tamil Superhit “Saivam” and the makers have used the script and narration without any major changes. Dagudumutha Dandakor is a simple storyline with some feel good moments between the grandfather and granddaughter. I have always believed that a good script could do wonders in a debut director hands, and a bad script could appear even worse. Dagudumutha Dandakor falls into latter category. There are very few instances in the film that are true crowd entertainers. But what’s disappointing is the script that depend a lot on Saivam and the improvisations made by the writer isn’t that natural or appealing. Though out the movie, one can feel the conflict between the director and script writer. While director Malineni was trying to keep the movie on a normal note, script was somewhat hyperbolizing the deeds of the main agonist. And the writing also fails to create a feel good bond among the audience while the entire film back getting totally emotional. The first half of the film is somewhat an indigestible exaggeration and the second half is a predictable message that will make us think but won’t touch us deeply.
Direction is on the positive side from Malineni. Those frames, steady cam shots of the village had that comforting factor. The weak point is the script as it took a lot of time to get into the point. The beauty of Saivam was that the content was spot on and even the small feelings between the roles were trying to convey something that really existed in the village society. But Dagudumutha Dandakor’s research seems to be quite peripheral. The dialogues were not that charming. The editing lags behind a bit and isn’t able to keep up the pace and sadly makes the film slower than it should have been. The film just runs over two hours, but it’s still incredibly long by any measure, and starts eroding at your forbearance levels. The cinematography is smartly done. It captures the narrative part of the film without any stray elements. Music by Es murthy is noteworthy, but it can’t stitch together this hushed up take on traditional and emotional values. The repeated usage of “Boo” “Booo” after a point becomes rather childish. Background Score keeps the tempo going and so does cinematographer capturing the village locations and chase sequences completely. The production values of First Frame Entertainment & Usha Kiron Movies are fine.
Dagudumutha Dandakor is a movie made with little passion but with a sense of urgency and desire to make some fast earnings. Telugu film industry is now witnessing the rise of new talent directors whose films look glossier and devoted. Malineni, who is certainly not less competence may have to learn lessons on remakes afresh. If the director followed through with the promising sequences in the first 20 0dd minutes, this could have been a feel good family drama. Director is not able to clearly balance the two main issues he has taken up. However, with neither the comic nor the family emotions living upto their promise, Dagudumutha Dandakor ends up as a half-baked attempt. It’s quite tragic since it has the potential to be so much more.
