Buchinaidu Khandriga

 

Despite the title Buchinaidu Kandriga hinting at something intense, the film turns out to be yet another routine love story. Director Poluru Krishna tries to pad up a routine drama with a message; however it fails to make an impact.

A school-going Balu and Swapna glance at each other innocently. They are influenced to believe it’s love by their friends. Romantic sequences are bound to follow and this draggy start to the film is peppered with some village humour to bore you even more. The story moves forward when a lead character decides to leave the village and Balu decides to do so too.

Two years later, Balu comes back searching for Swapna. Her half-saree has transformed into a saree but her love for Balu remains the same. However, her father’s casteist brain is still stuck in the past and he’s firm in his belief that his daughter will only marry someone from the same caste. To no one’s disbelief, the couple elope to Karnataka and you know what happens next. The film is so predictable that when Swapna eventually returns to the village, you know Balu is going to become a bearded alcoholic.

The message the director intends to deliver is rushed in the climax and the twist make you feel anything. Director Poluru however excels at writing a brilliant character, in the form of Balu’s father, played by Subba Rao of C/o Kancharapalem fame. The way the character is fleshed out and Subba Rao plays the role of a loving father who will go to any extent to save his son, lends the film some much-needed heft. Both the lead actors however deliver amateur performances. Ravi Varma is decent as the antagonist.

While it’s worth appreciation that Poluru chooses to touch upon the subject of honour killings, showing how it’s a relevant subject even today is something the film fails at.