Thella Kaagitham, produced by Krishna Kommalapati of Arunachala Creations, was released in theatres today.
Plot:
Ramu (Harsh Roshan), a school-going rural teenager, falls for his eleventh-grade classmate, Asha (Bogapathi Nakshatra). Though Asha is initially hesitant, Ramu’s persistent affection eventually wins her heart. Their sweet, blossoming high-school romance takes a drastic turn when the young couple gets intimate, leading to an unexpected pregnancy. Terrified of society and their strict families, the panicked teenagers desperately attempt to handle the situation on their own while keeping it hidden. Meanwhile, Asha's father (Ajay, as a pharmacist) is around the corner.
Post-Mortem:
Director Ramesh Bandreddi is late by two decades in terms of the climax and three decades in terms of treatment. Writer Nandu Savirigana’s story, screenplay and dialogue are so basic that tenderness goes missing in this film, despite the presence of two innocuous, unblemished teens. The derivative story, we are told, is based on a true-life incident. At the start, the narrator dedicates it to each and every single member of the audience. Unfortunately, music director Vijai Bulganin alone takes him seriously. The rest, including cinematographer KV Guhan and those of us watching his plain visual paper, have snapped out.
For a semi-conversational romantic drama (at least in the first half), the verbal exchanges between Asha and Ramu have tonal inconsistencies. In one scene, Ramu sounds too naive and childish to comprehend what she is telling him, while in others he talks like a consummate lover boy with the warmth of a hyper-empathetic husband candidate. The duo looks under-prepared and over-prepared in turns. One character thinks sanitary pads are a nutritional supplement that help girls win trophies.
There is a whole cringe-y stretch around abortion pills; an old woman in her 70s is deployed for double entendre. These portions could have mirrored the anxieties of the Ramu-Asha duo in a moving, nail-biting fashion if done right. But then, our filmmakers make movies just to keep us entertained.
The final portions were supposed to be disturbing. The run of the mill, plasticky treatment doesn't evoke a sense of pathos. A couple of shocking, horrendous events unfold conveniently to subserve the film's contrived climax. The many so-called tense moments need the background score to convey the intended yet unrealized impact. The film's undying itch to tickle the 'nibba' bone is jarring in the second hour. The unserious treatment never lets the viewer feel the dread of the lead pair. Humour is sought to be delivered in a one-note fashion: everytime someone uses an unknown English word, Ramu whips up a supposedly funny interpretation.
Ajay's father character comes with the energy of a sadistic villain for no reason. The jaded characterization serves no purpose other than justifying his daughter's perennial dread around him. He comes across as a vile landlord cinema dad (while he is a pharmacist in reality) from scene one, the heroine-father track never advances or touches your heart.
Harsh Roshan, after Court, has come to be seen as the go-to artist for POCSO-coded storylines. Thella Kaagitham needed the intensity of a slice-of-life rural love story, something a few Tamil directors used to be pastmasters of in the 2000s.
Closing Remarks:
Thella Kaagitham takes a sensitive teenage romance into unexpectedly serious territory but rarely finds the emotional weight it demands. Despite sincere performances, the film’s dated treatment, tonal inconsistencies, forced humour and convenient twists dilute its impact. What could have been a moving coming-of-age drama instead feels shallow, mechanical and dramatically unconvincing.
