Saindhav Cast: Venkatesh, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Arya, Shraddha Srinath, Ruhani Sharma, Andrea Jeremiah, Sara, Jayaprakash
Crew:
Music Director: Santosh Narayanan
Edited by Garry BH
Cinematography by S Manikandhan
Producer: Venkat Boyanapalli
Writer & Director: Sailesh Kolanu
Venkatesh Daggubati has made “Victory” his trademark and hence, fans refer to him Victory Venkatesh with all love. He has been a darling for Family audiences with equal appreciation from masses. At one time, he had such a golden run at box office that many thought he wil never deliver a bad movie or a flop. Well, with such a renowned reputation, he has reached the landmark of 75 films. Saindhav is his landmark 75th film and it released in theatres on 13th January, 2024. Let’s discuss about the film, in detail.
Plot:
Saindhav Koneru(Venkatesh Daggubati) decides to give up his life as a gangster and starts afresh with his daughter Gayathri(Baby Sara). His neighbour Mano(Shraddha Srinath) is a divorcee and a cab driver. She forms an unbreakable bond with this family and she has hopes to marry Saindhav. On the other hand, in Chandraprastha the drug cartel decides to deliver weapons and trained young boys to a terrorist organisation.
Head of the Cartel(Mukesh Rushi) gives the assignment to Vikas Malik(Nawazuddin Siddiqui). Vikas’s enemy(Jishu Sengupta) decides to stop him and leaks the information to customs officials. Vikas loves Jasmine(Andrea Jeremiah) but he is unable to confess to her. They get to know that customs have seized their containers. Meanwhile, Gayathri is diagnosed with rare genetic disorder SMA. To save her Saindhav needs 17 crores worth vial and he contacts Manas(Arya) for help. Will he secure vials? How these two aspects are inter-connected? Watch the movie to know.
Analysis:
Venkatesh after a comedy like F3 has decided to give action genre a go for his landmark 75th film. His performance and his swag stand-out. He changes in spilt-second from an emotional father to a ruthless assassin. He delivered such emotional beats, perfectly. But the problem lies with the script. It seems too convenient for the hero to be at all places without much jump in the time. Yes, commercial cinema doesn’t really have to adhere to such logics but film could have been better with all loop holes being tied up well enough.
Arya, Andrea Jeremiah, Shraddha Srinath are criminally underutilized. Their characters don’t really stay with us. Nawazuddin Siddiqui is one of the best actors and even though he is not given much to perform except shout “Ben Stokes”, he leaves a lasting impact. Baby Sara is cute and charming. Ruhani Sharma doesn’t make an impact and others too. The script in trying to be John Wick, Vikram and many drug cartel based Hollywood films at the same time, it falls flat without the necessary emotional connect.
At least for the action to leave an impact, the sequences needed to breath and be different from one another. Otherwise, it becomes just a 100 ways to massacre and that’s the issue with this one. It drags too much and tries to give a big action sequence at every possible outlet. Such approach has diluted the genuine emotional connect that the movie could have imbibed in audiences. It feels more like a showreel for Venkatesh to shoot a gun, blast a car and be the action hero that he wishes to be without any proper connecting factor. On the whole, it disappoints to see such good efforts from technical team especially, Cinematography and action department go in vain. Surprisingly, Santhosh Narayanan could not salvage the situation with his background score, too.
Positives:
Venkatesh’s screen presence and performance
Nawazuddin Siddiqui
Visuals and two action episodes
Baby Sara’s performance
Negatives:
SaNa’s music and BGM
Predictability
Too convenient screenplay
Monotonous action sequences in second hour
Underwhelming Narrative
Saindhav Movie Bottom-line: Saindhav lost his Footing
Rating: 2.25/5