Cast: Sumanth, Siddhu Jonnalagadda, Meenakshi Goswami, Aishwarya Rajesh, Brahmanandam, Vennela Kishore, Rajeev Kanakala, Malavika Nair

Crew: 

Written by Naga Muralidhar Namala, Santossh Jagarlapudi
Music by Anup Rubens
Cinematography by Krishnaa Prathap R
Editing by Junaid Siddiqui
Directed by Santossh Jagarlapudi
Produced by Madhu Kalipu, Laxman

Sumanth has been working on different scripts and he resorted OTT movies more often these days. He looked really pumped up with Mahendragiri Varahi film and the kind of story it brought to screen. Siddhu Jonnalagadda, Aishwarya Rajesh, Malavika Nair did cameos in the film and it released on 11th September. Let's discuss about the film in detail. 

Plot: 

Mahendragiri kin of Mahendragiri kingdom are cursed by Goddess Varahi (Aishwarya Rajesh) for mistreating women 200 years ago in 1826. Men from the kin die at the age of 33, on their birthday, mysteriously. In 1993, Rajendra Varma (Siddhu Jonnalagadda), an Atheist, gets killed while travelling on road with his pregnant wife (Malavika Nair). His mother (Manju Bhargavi) adopts her daughter's son, Narendra Varma (Vamsee Chaganti) and he is in danger in 2026. 

Siddharth (Sumanth) runs a YouTube channel against the superstitions and Satyam (Vennela Kishore) helps him while their elder brother Rajeev (Kamal Kamaraju) gives them the money. Siddharth's parents believe going to Mahendragiri Varahi temple will help Rajeev to get married without any issues. They go to the temple but they are shocked when Narendra and Rajeev, both die in similar fashion. Why did they die? Will the curse end? Is it really curse or people using the curse? Watch the movie to know more. 

Analysis: 

Sumanth is good in parts but he seems to have lost track of his performance due to the longer intervals the shoot stretched. He did well in the second half in very important portions where the story opens up after investigation. Siddhu Jonnalagadda is good in the portion given to him. Brahmanandam, Vennela Kishore get shocking characters but their performance did not match the weight. Rajeev Kanakala is good but lacks impact and all others are forgettable. 

Writing in this film is too amatuerish and it keeps jumping from point to point without real bridge scenes or interesting skeleton. There is a structure in the story, few plot points that tend to become common for such films yet the makers did not make any effort in writing and presenting them differently. The performances here are also very unconvincing. 

The story does draw comparison with Murari, as the curse portion and deaths do have parallels. Here, the movie fails establishing an emotional connect with Vamsee or Kamal's characters. Even the investigation that happens after their death looks completely written with negligence thinking that the audiences cannot really crack anything. It does not really let the clues be identified rather they just scatter them around and audiences are left exhausted when final twists arrive. 

The final twists seem to have been written with Aditya Karikalan's death in mind and then some old order style stories. At a time when the influence of Britishers had been so prominent, still continuing these murders like a mystery needed a lot more depth, imagination in writing. Cinematography is poor, makers did not even care about DI. Music by Anup Rubens is forgettable and production values do not match the story ambition. 

At low budgets, Malayalam industry has been trying these sort of stories from some time and here, makers failing to land the story, narrative properly shows the lack of skill. Makers did need to bring in better technicians and writing department to get a cohesive script for this story to land. Overall, the movie just disappoints and looks like a cheap rip-off of other God based investigative supersitious thrillers rather than a solid film. 

Positives:

Sumanth's performance
Few engaging twists

Negatives: 

Production values
Technicial abilities
Music
Underwhelming Writing
Bad Cienmatography 
Lethargic execution

Rating: 2/5 

Bottomline: A Forgettable Film. 

Disclaimer: The views/opinions expressed in this review are personal views/opinions shared by the writer and organisation does not hold a liability to them. Viewers' discretion is advised before reacting to them.