Dhammu Movie Review by Chaitanya Kumar Vummethala

After two consecutive flops (Shakthi & Oosaravelli) - NTR Jr. wanted to choose a perfect script for his next movie that should bring back his glory in tollywood and thus choose his favorite genre script, Dhammu. The young actor was pretty confident about scoring a big success to join the 40Cr+ Club / Top Five Earners - with this flick, but let us see how the movie is actually faring!

Screenplay & Direction: Boyapati Seenu, the four (4) movie young director has some rare talents of directing scenes extra-ordinarily, but as he is still young in the field needs to learn varied topics of highlighting the subject and theme as a whole while canning some brilliant scenes - which would then finally appreciated by the audiences. His efforts of pleasing big stars like Ravi Teja, Venkatesh, Bala Krishna & NTR Jr., with his subjects and scripts is simply appreciable, but the way he shapes out the final product is not so absolute perfect. Having described about his qualities, Boyapati again chose the same theme as of his previous movies (Mass-Action) once again for Dhammu. 

While the way he shaped the first half was admirable, the second half with lack of clarity on the story and subject was annoyed me - gently. Can do far better with the amount of talents he has (in my opinion), Boyapati should be more committed towards the project with some extra care on suitable casting, finalizing the ultimate theme of the movie and work according to that.

Story & Dialogues: M Ratnam, in a single word could not managed to do justice in either of these departments. Story / Script has many hiccups including the main theme - while Dialogues were not up to the mark, except few on political backdrop.

Music: Excellent BGM and a great value addition to the movie, MM Keeravani has once again proved that he can fill life to the soul with his contribution (RR) to Dhammu. Only complaint was the music for the first song (Crazy..) was not so catchy and remained as an only drawback in the entire first half (as per my opinion) of the movie. 

Editing: Kotagiri Venkateswara Rao was OK. For these kind of movies with exceptionally skilled director, one can hardly find mistakes in scenes so not much to criticize!

Cinematography: Arthur Wilson - was another asset to the movie. Originally the movie being planned to shoot in village atmosphere so there is an ample scope for Wilson to showcase his ability of capturing such natural beauties more beautifully. Excellent contribution and a great job by this gentleman.

Art: Anand Sai has done a decent job and deserves a great appreciation. 

Stunts: Ram-Lakshman duo have put their 100% to this movie and fights are simply amazing. As the action episodes are considered to be the biggest strengths to any Mass-Action oriented movie, fight masters have provided great stunts for Dhammu - suitable to NTR Jr.'s body language.

Producer: KA Vallabha has never compromised on any scene, every frame is filled with superb colors and excellent sets in brilliant locations. Highly appreciable for his commitment and confidence on the project.

Artists Performances:

Cast: NTR, Trisha, Karthika, Abhinaya, Nassar, Kota Srinivasa Rao, Suman, Bhanu Priya, Thottempudi Venu, Brahmanandam, Ali, Ahuti Prasad, Rahul Dev, Sridhar Rao, Subhalekha Sudhakar, Uttej etc.,

After an experimental flick (Oosaravelli) - NTR Jr. has realized the importance of super success that he is badly in need of and thus selected his favorite theme (i.e., Action Oriented Script) and as usually performed exceptionally well to occupy the top place in the performers list of this project. Trisha and Karthika were just OK as glamour dolls but would have excelled with the scope that they were provided to perform. 

Nassar was amazingly wonderful in his all new getup and except in the climax, overall he has outperformed. 

Kota and Suman were as usual, while Brahmi and Ali tried to bring some laughs and just got pass marks. Bhanu Priya and Abhinaya both performed well within their limited confusing roles, All the other supporting cast including Venu, Subhalekha Sudhakar among others were just OK.

Sampath Raj's performance was good among all the antagonists excluding Nassar. 

Overall Analysis: 

First half was brilliantly narrated (except the hero introduction) with unexpected twists and gripping narration along with power packed action and slight comedy sequences, especially the interval bang has got tremendous response. 

Second half has started well but director was failed in managing the script with his usual style of narration and added a bit of pale drama scenes in between which is a big let down. Towards the climax no one expects the kind of treatment that was opted by the captain.  The movie would have reached greater heights if the same level of flow was continued even in the second half with similar gripping narration and tight script as shown in  the first half. But unexpected twists and few useless scenes have stopped the movie to touch that elevation.

Positives include - NTR Jr. Performances, Direction (few episodes), Cinematography, Background Music, Action Episodes, Few Dialogues, etc., and the Drawbacks of the movie are mismatch of casting, lack of full length comedy episodes and lack of clarity on the story and subject, missing melodious music etc.,

Mass Movie in a New Pattern  - 2.5/5 is my rating for NTR Jr.'s Dhammu.....