Rama Krishna Sangem
Naga Chaitanya, or Chay’s long wait for a proper super hit may or may not happen with “Custody”, but this racy action flock will definitely keep him stay afloat – for another super hit sometime later. This 148 minute Telugu, Tamil bilingual movie will certainly break even and even make decent profits to the producer – Srinivasaa Chitturi. Story and direction: Venkat Prabhu. Telugu dialogues by Ravi Abburi.
This star studded film – Krithi Shetty, Priyamani, Aravind Swamy, R Sarathkumar, Sampath and Vennela Kishore and Jiva- should actually leave no scope for performance for Chay. But, surprisingly, Chay made use of this crowded screen to his advantage in every scene. Usually, stories built on Tamil background show family life as central point and this film is no different.
Still this action packed travel movie comfortably mingles with family drama of main characters. Chey as ordinary police constable who gets a job on compassionate grounds in place his deceased brother Jiva is a cool but focused youth. Krithi Shetty as Revathi, a self-respecting girl who can take adventures, did justice to her role. Aravind Swamy, as Raazu, a bad guy,and Sarathkumar as Nataraj, a bad police officer steal the show.
Priyamani is Drakshayani, Chief Minister of a regional party, has fewer dialogues, but she did a splendid job as an ambitious and ruthless CM. Sampath Raj as CBI officer George, has a brief presence, but left a large impression. The story line also deal with the present day conflict between CBI, in the hands of a ruling party at the Centre and a regional party in power in a state. CBI officers and state police firing at each other is the creative heights of this movie.
Story line is simple, yet multilayered. Priyamani as CM is behind many illegal and anti-social activities to keep her chair. She uses Aravind Swamy for these illegal things and murders. She also uses Sarathkumar, police officer too for these dirty things. Sampath, a CBi officer catches Aravind Swamy and is supposed to produce him in a Bangalore court in a couple of days time. Priyamani sends Sarathkumar to kill Swamy.
That Aravind Swamy has a one-side love with Priyamani is a cool angle to this story.
How and why Chay takes up the job of producing Aravind Swamy in the court and what happens next is the story. All the characters travel at two levels – time and emotions. Venkat Prabhu wrote the story so well as that even little mannerisms and expressions of Priyamani, Aravind Swamy or Sarathkumar stay with us long. Illayaraja and Yuvan Sankar Raja gave music, SR Kathir, cinematography and Venkat Raajen editing.
The movie is made on a modest budget of Rs 30 -35 crore and is expected to easily break even within two weeks. As it has two markets – Telugu and Tamil, the collections can be reasonable. Trade analysts say, on the first two days, it collected around Rs 12 crore is on way to make good business by the first weekend. OTT rights will anyway be there to bail out the makers. Chay can own up this movie.
