Gamyam – Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant…
Just finished this awesome movie by first time director Krish (Radhakrishna)…Its brilliant…I haven’t seen a better telugu film in past 5 yrs…there were occasional decent films like Aaduvari Matalaku Ardhale Veerule (AMAV), Anand, Godavari, Aithe and Anukokunda Oka roju but this one is simply great…I’m excited and finally found a film that i can share with my buddies…lot of hindi and tamil speaking friends ask me about any good films in telugu…I always reply them saying “we produce the greatest pieces of trash in this whole fucking universe, so dont bother”…but this one is great…..
Gamyam is about a rich kid’s journey to meet his girlfriend who leaves him because she feels that both of them have different approach to life and in the process he discovers life and meets very very interesting people. Gamyam is very very close to reality….when you look at various characters in this film you get a feeling that you know these kind of people. I have never seen rural andhra being captured so close in past 10 yrs or so….May be Bapu or Vamsi’s time line. Rayalseema and andhra slang is perfect in this film. For past 10 yrs or so there are lot of artists who do dubbing even though they dont get the slang of the area that a particular character belongs too…they just dub because their voice is sweet.
Sharwanand plays the rich kid and Kamilini Mukherje plays his girl friend but Allari Naresh who plays gaali seenu is simply briliant in all aspects he played his character with lot of energy (His character has lot of similarities to Jagapati Babu’s in Anthapuram), his body language and dialogue delivery is simply awesome. Gamyam has some dull moments but if you ignore them there are lot of bright and enriching moments through out the film. I always thought of Allari Naresh as under rated B-grade actor but I have never expected to perform as he did in this film, He has improved a lot with every film. Though there was never a doubt about his comic timing but he never showcased his talent while performing emotional scenes, through gamyam he was able to do that.
I have heard lot of people saying that Gamyam is remake of “The Motorcycle Diaries” but its not. The only similarity that you will find in both the films is that they are based on journey of main protagonist and a side-kick helping in process, thats where the similarity ends other than that both are totally different films. Krish is now on my list of “Directors to watch out”….I hope he dosent go the commercial route like chandrashekar yelati (who was lost after 2 brilliant films Aithe and Anukokunda roju, I wonder whats his next film is??)
Tags: allari naresh, Telugu
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Varun..Finally :-)
Yes..Gamyam has flaws..especially the pacing, the way flashbacks were shown, etc…but, is definitely a very important movie in Telugu Film Industry…ahah..and varun..your article actually releases a sigh of relief..more tha anything ” abba..atlast ek acchi picchar bani telugu mein”
Alllari Naresh was top class..never was a dull moment with him around..i was actually shocked when i saw how he talks to that old lady..then i realised..hmm thats the character..and thats how rustic rural people talk…
Moreover, its Krish’s first film..hence..sau guneh maaf…waiting for his next
I don’t know about the film man but love the poster.
Varun,
Gamyam was good but surely would look amateurish when pitted against the films that PFC is proud about.
It surely is good or even the best when you compare it with the stuff that is coming out of telugu cinema.
But I am more worried on your picks, your list includes some of the crappiest cinema ever AMAV, Anand, Godavari against the PFC standards.
We the bechara telugu cinema crowd actually had no choice but to give those movies a classic status.
In my opinion , Just because they did not had unnecessary fights, hero intro songs, mass dialogues, faction themes, crass comedy doesn’t make them a good cinema.
They are still crap.
Whenever we telugu cinema get a Black Friday/Manorama/Khosla kind of cinema then we could really feel proud at PFC…I am still waiting…
@ Ravi…waiting for that day as well…but, a movie like Vanaja doesnt release…kya karein? Was lucky to watch it in 06 and was bowled over..it was cute, it was sweet, it was hard-hiting..all in one..
But, just cause we are waiting for a master-piece, we cannot ignor small nice movies..after-all “superb” movies dont get made every noww and then..so, IMHO, we should watch other movies and appreciate it for the emotions it was able to stir in us…an emotion..and see the movie in the whole package kind of way..rather than..i didnt like this..i didnt like that..
grrr…abhi i doing band to my gyaan ..lol!!
The movie is inspired from ‘Motorcycle Dairies’.
@OM
The rawness is naresh’s character is something that i didnt see in a telugu film for a long time…the way he talks to oldlady and oldman is very real…I’m from telangana area i used visit my village during summer holidays and i have seen so many people like this…may be thats why i liked it more than some of you..Just like most middle aged guys are liking Rock On….
@Ravi
Sorry brother if dont like my selection of movies…I liked AMAV because of chemistry b/w kota and venky…and its got pretty decent songs…i dont think its bad film its been remade into Tamil (Yaradi ne mohini) and Kannada..Anand and godavari because I liked the characterization of female lead…she is very irritating at items and cute..may be thats how it was meant to be..no worried if you didnt like them..I dont think PFC has any standards of liking films…you like something or you dont but you definetly can express why you liked and why you didnt…I dont watch any film expecting it be Manorama or BF or KKG…i just see it…Its fair to expect something good..
@Krishna
What made u say that its copied from motorcyle diaries?? jus curious to know your reasoning??
@Varun
grrrrrrrrrrrrrr :-)
@Dpac
phurrrrrrrrrrrrr..:-)
The bar is so low in telugu films, that some-what-decent-for-a-first-timer films get classified as classics. That’s the sad truth.
@varun
i did not say that it was copied….
Sorry varun, disagree big time.
The movie was bad, not because it lacked the script – it was a fine idea, but the execution. I won’t go deeper as there is no point in reviewing it further and that a debut effort should always be appreciated but having watched a telugu movies in ages, it was a complete let down.
Varun, the only reason i had been seeing Telugu movies of late was for time pass, its another matter, that 90% of them, could not even offer decent time pass. Anyway Gamyam notwithstanding its flaws, is really the best movie of 2008 so far.
To date most of the Telugu movies i had been seeing in recent times, were the watch and forget kind. But Gamyam was different, after a very long time, a Telugu movie, stuck to me hours together, after i came out of the theater. I found myself running through the dialogues again and again, the scenes again.
Also the second thing is would i watch this movie again? I really liked Anand in the first viewing. But somehow on repeat viewings, could never really sit through it. I mean it just felt a tad too amateurish at places. But Gamyam was a movie, which inspite of repeat viewings, i could neve feel bored of.
Also the characterization worked for. You really feel for Allari Naresh, when he dies in the end. You want Sarvanand to go back to his girl. And its not just the main characters, what worked for me in Gamyam, were the supporting characters, Giribabu as the head of an orphanage, Brahmanandam’s cameo, Hema, all of them stay with you. And the dialogs are really top notch.
I sincerely hope with success of Gamyam, Telugu movie industry gets out of the rut of “super-hero” movies or inane “Youth” movies, which are basically no better than “Boy meets Girl” stories.
Chandrashekar Yelati wrote screenplay for Viskha Express. The movie has Allari Naresh playing the negative role.
“orrey! nenu puli biddani ra”
“annay! puli mee intiki vacchinda leda mee amma adaviki vellinda”
THE dialogue of 2008 (Gamyam) ;) ;) ;)
somehow cannot digest the fact that Anand, and Godavari are hailed as classics! Yes, Anand was a decent movie but a mere adherence to “telugu nostalgia-old movies-rains-bajji,pakodi-semi classical music” doesn’t a classic film make… When you set this in a modern milieu with characters whose body language, characterisation, behavior, talk, costumes one could easily relate to, you are bound to get audiences as there for such themes. So really you do not have to go mainstream, and the stakes are really low. But imagine going against the tide in 1991, and 1993 when you couldn’t dare go niche, that too in Telugu land and coming up with Kshana Kshanam and Gaayam replete with stars. That is guts and ballsy.
Aaaah! still waiting for that jugalbandi between Tanikella Bharani and Kota Srinivasa Rao in a truly mainstream effort.
Gamyam has flaws; glaring, many of them. Agreed.
Gamyam, to a critic, would perhaps look like a failure, an amateurish attempt at a road movie, with tinges of impractical self-righteousness and loads of cinematic ignorance. Debatable, but agreed!
Gamyam is definitely not your typical movie – the one which you can watch sitting in your comfort zone, forgetting all your problems, and, if possible, yourself, for a couple of hours.
Nava rasas – Haasya, Sringara, Veera, Bhayanaka, Roudra, Bheebhatsa, Adbhuta, Karuna, Shanta – are the nine basic emotions that supposedly form the core ingredients for a traditional Indian art form, and the same rules, transcending generations, can be seen applied in the Indian storytelling till date.
Depending on the emotion that gets the lion share, the story/movie/play gets genre-fied as such.
Gamyam, that way, is a difficult movie to be classified into any genre.
It has most… no… all the nava rasas entwined, interlinked and played undercurrent. The main thread however, is the journey of the protagonist. The physical journey apart, the metaphysical journey his psyche takes is the point that matters. It’s a powerful, purposeful, purification process. Travel on the road to self-discovery. Knowing thyself and healing thyself. Discovering the fragility, the intricacy, the profound nature of the entity called *life*. Making peace with the contradictions, the irregularities, the opinionated ideologies, and preconceived notions that rule ones life.
That is what is the respecting, applauding and deeply humbling factor of Gamyam. Watch it, for its tenth rasa – Daya or humanity.
As I mentioned somewhere else, Gamyam is more of a visual treatise than a movie. It would have seen more commercial success and critical acclaim had it been published as a book, not unlike Paul Coelho’s works.
Thanks Varun for giving this movie a page/place on PFC.
wow wow wow..wow wb sir…simply wow…
geez..i have been rying to find something of the similar sorts to explain to my friends on what constitues a good watch…geez..this is damn apt..i was talking about tickling any one emotion in me..and bang here comes your analysis of nava-rasa..freaking awesome…love you :-)
@ santosh…that def, has to be the best dialogue…frwking amazing and the delivery was superb..lol
well for non-telugu speaking audience here is the translation( very tough, but trying)
” Oyye i am the son of a tiger..son of a tiger”
Allari naresh goes very innocently
” Sir did the tiger coem to your house or did your mother go to the tiger?”
Wb sir, too much kada???
Honestly, not being a critic here but truly, it lacked the basic element to make something watchable – screen presence.
In one of the above comments, some one mentioned Anand and godavari. Not classics, no way, but a movie at some level should be watchable, the story apart – the performance too. For some reason, it is very uncomfortable right from the word go and I would have been happy if it was cos of the story or the underlying spirit, but some of the conceived sub-plots just make you want to bang your head at just mull over why a scene is there when it could so easily have been done away with.
Om, thanks for that, but I am afraid Lost in Translation
Allari Naresh’s Gaali Seenu was raw and perhaps his rawness (in a realistic way) was matched if not surpassed by Santosh Reddy’s Baalu of Dollar Dreams (Sekhar Kammula, 1999). The scene where he gives his piece of mind to the US returned lad in a bakery is to be seen…
I honestly feel that “Gamyam” is just a feel good movie, just like “Rock on”..I know u can not relate dese 2 movies..but dey somehow resemble in viewing experience and honestly i am not fan of des kind of movies..
1) They are not hard hitting.
2) They dont have even a single scene to ground the viewer.
3) They r classics when watched on a TV.
I agree, there are lot, who luv to watch theese kind of movie on a silver screen…
Finally Gamayam aint a great one but a different one for sure.
There is a bit of freshness in the film. It cant be denied. When we see so many characters and so many locations, we may loose the film from our mind. I think Mr.Krish did a great job by narrating the story in a crisp way without any confusion. Let me tell a small incident here. I went with my mother and grandma (ladies out) and we three liked the film for different reasons. Its like a book, has its own meaning according to the reader. I felt Gamyam can be rated as classic in future, without a doubt., ofcourse much depending on Krish later works. I hope he is the answer for telugu film industry.
And finally, when we crying out the substandards in our films, we should appreciate this new talent and we should forgive with a big heart if we find any mistakes.
Thank you Varun for a beautiful review. I completely agree with u about this motor cycle diaries thing. Gamyam is a completely original work., that we can see in the recording dance scene and Naxaals scene…. Good Job Varun.
ravptor sir, how much is too much?
>> some of the conceived sub-plots
>> just make you want to bang your
>> head at just mull over why a
>> scene is there when it could
>> so easily have been done away with.
forgive us lesser mortals, sir. to each his own. evadi picchi vaadiki aanandam.
the tiger joke is old hat.
OM,
I appreciate your +ve outlook.
But unfortunately Telugu cinema never had the aptitude to produce sensible cinema and i guess it is a herculean task to produce one in future too.
Hindi cinema always had a fairly good dose of sensible cinema (I hate to term it as Art Cinema) since long time. From the likes of Shyam benegal, Mrinal Sen, Govind nihalini and numerous others, they all had a undeniable influence even though they faced tough competition from main stream cinema.
They produced some of the finest cinema even though they have been ridiculed as festival film makers and also most of their work didn’t even got a decent release in the mainstream.
Reason, back then there were only few people who had the sensibilities to appreciate that kind of cinema.
Times have changed now that number seem to have grown and now its a sizeable number…and that’s the reason we see films like Black Firday/Manorama/Aamir/Khosla are getting appreciated.
So my point is Sensible cinema always coexisted with feel good & crap cinema and also its not an over night phenomenon in Hindi, Bengali,Malayalam,Kannada,Tamil…. but UNFORTUNATELY we telugu’s never cared. We are at least 30 yrs behind the hindi cinema leave alone the world cinema.
We Telugu’s always had either CRAP or feel good cinema but never Sensible Cinema (Only genuine effort being Maa Bhoomi which was appreciated too).
So with this generations of brain wash of crap cinema, Telugu audiance are not trained/aware of what the real cinema is …so even a film like Vanaja would end up in dust or in festival circuit.
Had if it was made in Hindi it would have got a decent audiance
So OM do u still see hope?
How was Aa Naluguru..havent seen it..but heard good things about it
Aa Naluguru worked for me big time courtesy Kota Srinivasa Rao again! His climactic outburst near the pyre may seem a tad manipulative but was effective, and moving. Again if you ignore the execution which was not great but not bad either, Karunakaran’s Toli Prema (1998) scored for its concept.
But yet to see a Pithaamagan (2003) in Telugu which hits you in the solar plexus. But strangely I do not blame the directors. It is the audiences I blame. Their tastes, their acceptance threshold, receptiveness to something new, whether a thought, concept, idea is not very encouraging. AND I am not just talking movies here. Having been a part of the Telugu community, a gult myself, across places and regions, it is not an exaggeration to say that. We do not want to be the laughing stock by trying something radical, lifting and god forbid failing. We will refine the tried and tested and give the “best” then. Schools, Junior colleges, Degree colleges, Engineering schools in AP will tell you that.
It is why a Ramgopal Varma is held in high esteem amidst all the flops, controversies, AND the mindfucking philosophies notwithstanding.
Aa Naluguru was still old-school but “worked” because of performances by two senior men. Perhaps the topic, issue was/is still relevant. Slightly different presentation.
One of the biggest curses afflicting Telugu movies is the fan club culture. Who are these fan clubs? A bunch of ignoramuses, who have no clue about movies, a bunch of losers, who have nothing else to do, but laze in front of theaters and parks. I had been in some of the fan club discussions myself, and most of them would be like this “Hero X has a huge poster at Y junction, we must make sure we get a bigger poster than that”, “Hero A had palabhishekam to his cutout, let us ensure we do the same for our hero”.
Nothing wrong with fan worship, it is prevalent even in Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka. In fact in Kerala there is always this big time rivalry between fans of Mohanlal and Mamooty. But in Tamil Nadu, fans of Surya or Vikram, take pride in their heroes doing a Pithamagan or Kakha Kaakha or Ghazini. In sharp contrast when Chiranjeevi, went for an image change in Apathbandhavudu, there was a huge cry by the fans, and the reason , it is said there was a scene when Chiru looks at himself in the mirror and curses himself, calling himself a loser. The so called fans could not digest this, and made a huge commotion. Even many of these so called fans, did not like Tagore, as the second half was too heavy and did not have masala. What the fuck? Honestly with these kind of fanatics, can we expect some decent mainstream movies.
Forget about a Black Friday or a Pithamagan, can we at least expect a Chak De India, from any one of our Tollywood heroes. Can we expect any one of our stars to play second fiddle to a kid, the way Aamir did in TZP? Even if they tried to do, you can be very sure, that these very knowledgable fans will start to protest and break panes. And the quality of movie reviewing online, is equally atrocious. Most of the movie reviews, seem to be written by morons with no clue of cinema at all. Thankfully there are some writers like Gudapoodi Srihari, who understand what movie making is all about.
And this in turn is becomming a kinda vicious circle. The fans dont want their beloved hero, to try something else. The common audience, who are not fans of any actor, are bored to death of the Super Heros and their Super Dialogues. How long can they watch exploding Sumos, fiery dialogues about “Pourasham”, super heroism and heroines who cant even speak their own dialogues in Telugu?
Is not the failure of Oka Magadu, Don, Andarivaadu, Jai Chiranjeeva, Sainikudu, Subash Chandra Bose, Veerabhadrudu, Bangaram and a host of other commercial blockbusters in recent times, a cry from the audiences, saying “We had enough”. But it seems the message is lost on our stars and producers, as they keep producing the same crap again and again.
To add to what Santosh said, Ram Gopal Verma, was totally hounded out of the movie industry. There was a vicious campaign against him in the Telugu movie media too, alleging that he corrupted the Telugu culture( whatever that means). Some even accused him of encouraging youth to take to violence, because of Shiva. This was a man who gave some excellent directors to Telugu movie industry like Krishna Vamsi, and who was the role model for other promising directors like Uppalapati Narayana Rao.
As Santosh says, the audiences like movies which are safe and family friendly. Venky’s Gharshana, though not as good as the Tamil original Kaaka Kaakha, but a much better movie than the standard Telugu flicks, was rejected, because it was not the usual family movie, which they expected from Venky.
Virumandi and Pithamagan, in their dubbed Telugu versions were runaway hits, but had they been remade in Telugu, i doubt if they would have been succesful. It seems like some kind of mentality, which says that such movies are fine in Tamil or Malayalam, but we want only the standard formula crap in Telugu.
I am surprised when Gamyam (2008) was lapped up by the commoners, AND the media, the industry alike. Not to take away anything from the movie, but for a place notorious for suppressing slightly off the track fare the reaction was a big surprise. Gossip websites which by and large are the representation of the general public taste in A.P going ga ga over the film instead of branding it too “niche” (which of course it wasn’t), “over-the-head” was a surprise. Industry bigwigs from all “communities” lauding the director ( read it again, the director that too a debutante) was a surprise. Political correctness aside, I am only tempted to point my fingers at that phenomenon which has been ailing the telugu industry in particular. I sincerely hope I am wrong. (aaah, it is not difficult to imagine the camps, the second rung heroes, the comedy “batch” deriding the new talent trying to do something new) Jagarlamudi Krish apparently escaping all that and bagging big banners is a hmmmmm, change!
rant ends..
But Varun you are right, the true star is Allari Naresh. I haven’t seen a more spontaneous act in recent times.
I think the real problem is with both film makers and audience.
All Telugu film makers make and market their film for all audiences, Where as film makers in hindi since few years have wisened up and are making and MARKETING different generes and kind of movies to diff level of target audiances.
Take for instance AAmir/Mithya, was made with reasonable budget and was marketed and released to the target audience and it made money and is a hit with in that niche audience.
Where as in Telugu if someone makes a decent movie for a niche audience…its marketed and released no different than a crap movie.
Audiences who does not connect or relate to that kind of a movie end up watching it and pass judgment on it.
We telugu’s being extra passionate on movies we take it to heart. Each one of us, right from rikshawalla to executive is a box office guru in his own right.
Every other AppaRao after watching a flick, instead of having an opinion on the merits and demerits of the movie takes the avatar of a box office guru…predicts its fortunes as either “Utter Flop mama cinema” “Super Duper Hit babai”…the word spreads and we all being a “gorrela gumpu”…take it to heart and either kill a good movie or make a crap movie hit at box office.
No one considers a movie as a movie on its own merits…all we see is ..will it be a box-office hit or not.
Everyone might have experienced this…even my MOM who is educated…when a decent movie telecasts on TV chooses to view it based on her recollection of being it a hit or flop when it had a theater release.
“Cinema flop anta yem choostam le”
Another instance
My 50+ uncle was commenting on Happy Days that “Antha college, love ani motham adhe, yem baaledhu”.
I would have said, “Its not meant for u, Its meant for college gowing crowd and people who still relate to that stuff”
We love to categorize /generalize things which is very dangerous.
And coming back to the real point…Our film makers need to make and market movies to their target audience.
If in Telugu a movie like Black Friday/Aamir is made with appropriate economics and marketed well to the target audience…it would definitely fetch good returns and would encourage good cinema further.
To be continued…
@ Ravi comment #23
I disagree big time that telugu cinema didnt make good films for 30yrs…you are over looking lot of good films…and I never said anand, godavari or AMAV as classics they are decent films thats it….
@Ratnakar
Yes, unless all these so called fans turn into normal audiences we will still keep making bad films….but an occasinal decent film like gamyam should be appreciated by everyone so that after 10yrs we will progress in quality of our films…
@WB
thanks…i like the way you talked about navarasa’s…
I think if we keep encouraging decent films then in 5 or 10yrs down the lane we will make good films..one problem that i see is if a college theme based film is hit then you see atleast 7 or 8 films with similar theme for next couple of years…this has happend with factionism theme, revenge theme and all…untill our producers become sensible we will keep making the same maovies that we did for past 5 yrs or so…
Just now finished watching this movie.
The lead actors have done good job.
The movie looked fresh and the climax sequences were genuinely touching – Allari Naresh as the livewire is genuinely entertaining. The sadness and the lump in the throat feeling I had in the end was a sure indicator that the movie works allright and I am not even a fluent/frequent Telugu listener . The movie was in total contrast to what ‘happy days’ became towards the end Which began so well to suck towards the end.