Saripodhaa Sanivaaram

domestic abuse, physical violence, blood

• Cast: Nani, S J Suryah, Sai Kumar, Murali Sharma, Priyanka Mohan…
• Director, Writer: Vivek Athreya
• Music Director: Jakes Bejoy

Surya struggles with anger management and copes by limiting his confrontations with people to Saturdays. Leading to a life of chaos and violence, things take a turn for the worse when he meets CI Dayanand and is caught between him and the people of Sokulapalem.  The rest of the movie is about how he finds his way in supporting the people and balancing his relationships and principles. 

Acknowledging that anger and rage are emotions that can be channeled and regulated is what gives this story a new lens. Although a simple story about a man seeking justice for a people, it stands out in its attempt to see anger as a potential motivator for building community.

• Direction: Vivek Athreya proves once again that he knows how to narrate a story engagingly. The story in general moved at a quick pace while still keeping the audience on the same page. In the second half, there were a couple moments where it seemed the story slowed down a little bit only because the rest of the movie moved at a much faster pace. The interactions between characters were set up to look natural, playing well into the progression of the movie – for example, the poultry farmer cycling around delivering eggs at night interacts with people on his way – he is going about his day as a part of the story, not forced into places you wouldn’t expect him to be.
• Acting: SJ Suryah and Murali Sharma gave stunning performances as ruthless rivals. They both went above and beyond in uniquely carving out their characters at every opportunity. Sai Kumar, Nani, and Aditi Balan have excellent chemistry together as a family. Harsha Vardhan, as Sudha, gave a great performance, continuing to add depth to scenes both when he did and didn’t have dialogue.
• Cinematography: There were consistent color palettes for Sokulapalem (yellow); Surya (blue with red added on Saturdays) and CI Dayanand (dark green). While the colors interacted well when characters crossed paths, the introduction of red into scenes felt forced at times. The smoothest introductions of red were in the pub with the use of the background and in the final fight with the use of fire. The most unnatural was in the fight between Narayana’s men and him after he wakes up from being drugged – the red light looks like a spotlight placed right outside his window for no apparent reason. A huge favor that the cinematography did to this movie was take over how the fights were depicted – using the music, camera movement and lighting that they did. The focus was actually taken off of Surya’s violence and more directed towards his anger and motivations. The fight in Surya’s house was impactful and exciting to watch.
• Production Design: The color palettes were supported by the clean sets that were detailed and well done – like the used belongings across Surya’s house, the car used by CI Daya, and the dirty walls and floor of the jail cell.
• Editing: The movie flowed well for the most part with one or two odd moments here and there that were a bit jarring. One that stood out was the transition from the visual of Chayadevi after Surya learns what she thinks true anger is to the scene at Sokulapalem. Other than small moments like that, most of the screentime was used efficiently.
  The last fight however could have been made shorter – they repeated the use of the perspective and production used in the fight inside Surya’s house. With the most impactful part of the final fight being the people of Sokulapalem fighting off Dayanand’s people, Surya’s scene could have been cut shorter.
• Music: Jakes Bejoy was an excellent choice for this movie. He has a track record of making background scores that magnify the emotions of scenes. He did the same in this movie with his music elevating tension between characters.
• Dialogues: The dialogue was the best part of this movie that truly put a bow on it, bringing together all the other elements of this movie. With carefully written Telugu dialogue, and wonderful actors to put voice to the words – there was a smooth flow that has become rare in the recent past.
• Themes: There are a couple consistent themes that popped up across the movie
  • Living by principles – Surya lives by his principles of sharing people’s problems and supporting people without creating a dependency on him
  • Community – Surya and the people of Sokulapalem, although expressing it differently, have a strong sense of community in the way they live

• Compared to how the rest of the movie went, the scene with Daya realizing Surya was the person he was looking for was underwhelming both directorial and music wise.
• Another reveal that was underwhelmed by production was Daya announcing to Sokulapalem that the masked man was Surya – it was drowned out by music that didn’t really match the vibe of that scene
• The best reveals in the movie –
  • When we find out that Surya’s Dad is telling the psychologist (Jhansi) about Surya only to let her know that her husband is his next target
  • Daya revealing that Kurmanand is his brother by talking about Govardhan’s sons
• Sai Kumar and Aditi Balan have fleshed out characters, allowing them to be active participants in the story. For the most part, when there are sons and fathers that don’t get along, the father character plays a role only to serve as comedy but not to react and respond as a father.
• I loved all the foreshadowing that added consistency across characters and themes
  • The story that Surya recites as a kid is what happens in the second half of the movie – he teams up with Charulatha hoping to defeat Daya who was terrorizing the people of Sokulapalem
  • Surya in the first half of the movie tells people his line about how making people dependent on you for help is selfish but supporting people in knowing how to support themselves is accountability – this principle of his plays out as a motivation for both his work as an insurance agent and as a guide to channel his anger on Saturdays
• While there was a deflection away from violence in the way his fights were depicted, Surya was a very violent person that did put his anger above a lot of relationships. While it was good that he turned it around towards the end, it also didn’t need to be glorified in the way it was especially in the first half.

Yes. This one is a Maguva recommend.

This one might not be for everyone – people that enjoy action and are up for watching dark characters will easily get behind this movie.

• Principles are a large focus of Shankaram and Chayadevi’s parenting which set the scene for the movie and was heartwarming to watch
• There were a lot of unisex names which I absolutely loved – Daya, Sudha, Bhadhra, etc
• The child actress playing Lalli did a really good job of commanding the scenes she was in
• The colors of the movie were very fun –
  • The hands on the clock in the pub are red (Surya’s color is blue, with red being added on Saturdays)
  • As Surya is contemplating whether or not to give up his Saturdays because his sister asked him to, he plays with a half red and half blue pencil, placing the pencil blue side up – indicating that he did decide to give up his old ways of expressing anger on Saturdays
  • I don’t know what the thought process was behind this creative decision – Kurmanand’s color palette (if I’m not wrong, I only saw the movie once lol) is a light pastel green, while Daya’s is a dark green
    • Is that because he is milder than Daya when it comes to channeling his emotions? Example – Daya beats people up without a second thought while Kurmanand’s idea of humiliation is making Daya wait and watching him getting frustrated through security cameras
• SJ Suryah’s background music was my personal favorite
• Surya’s Dad describes his son as having a split personality – what took it too far for me is the half beard during the fight with Narayana Prabha’s henchmen – just not for me, I appreciate the effort though
• I work in mental health, I for one have never heard about a “fixated mindset” – Jhansi’s dialogue could use some work there – stating the obvious didn’t really do much for that scene
• Nani is now at a stage where he has his own references in his movies, here’s the ones I noticed
  • Mentions of Eega and Nani/Samantha being love interests
  • Using “veera prema gaadha” in a dialogue – in reference to his movie Krishna Gaadi Veera Prema Gaadha
  • Daya calling Surya’s performance “natural” – reference to his tagline “Natural Star Nani”
• Favorite dialogue
  • “Naaku kopam vachindhi, naaku kopam vachindhante adhi na samasya”

• Movie Rating: 7.5/10
• Maguva Impact Scale: +2