Movie Review - Ulavacharu Biryani (Telugu) - Culinary consonance!!

Right from the title of the film, director Prakash Raj serves a cross-cultural platter to appease the taste buds. With umpteen references to the characters’ fondness to their culinary escapades, he creates a milieu for them to bond and share things that may seem to be unconventional yet soulful. This is a true accomplishment for a director who walks against the grain and shuns his regular avatar to strew some fine spices, which work to get the required flavor. 

There are also some ingredients that alter the taste, but when you have the chords of Maestro Ilayaraja to complement and compliment the cookery, the broth can’t get spoiled. Ulavacharu Biryani (remake of Malayalam hit film Salt N Pepper) tries to make a balancing act and emerges as a matured love story with loads of fun and frolic. And, it's good to see the names of Trivikram and Puri Jagannadh in the 'Acknowledgments' section. May be the former might have worked on the climax – the dialogues in which are a reflection of his typical style. 

The story is of a 45 year old archaeologist Kalidasu (Prakash Raj) – the name may be an allusion for his love towards archaic things. He is a foodie who loves to cook, and can’t stomach the fact that someone poked in his dish. He is a bachelor and that’s the reason for his uncle’s plight. A wrong call gets him close to a 36 year old dubbing artist Gowri (Sneha). She is also a single woman and they strike a friendship instantly when they learn that they share a common interest and craving for 'food'. In a predictable way, this acquaintance over phone blossoms into love. However, they can’t pull this relationship further fearing for their age. Then the onus shifts to the youngsters – Naveen (Tejas) and Meghana (Samyuktha) – to unite this pair, but they in turn pave way for comedy of errors.

Prakash Raj churns an off-beat drama and proves his mettle both as an actor and director. The way he fixes the professions of his characters surface their inner self. An archaeologist likes to excavate something precious from the earth and from people’s heart. A voice-over artist always tries to listen to her inner voice and echo others’ feelings. Then with some allegorical references he makes the proceedings interesting – be it the opening montage of food items, which salivate your hunger pangs or be it the witty dialogue at proper places.

The director juxtaposes the emotional highs and lows of the lead pair as a neatly drawn geometric figure. In the film, the characters of Kali and Gowri face similar problems and feel emptiness in their lives at the same time. It’s like them taking turns to repeat an agonizing moment. The characters are believable and appear true to life with more than able performances of Prakash Raj and Sneha. Even their short Black & White back stories add a lot to validate their penchant for 'food'.    

Though the sub-plot of an aadivasi, and the entire set-up of a company trying to exploit him, seems unwarranted; it was used effectively in the latter half to create a void in Kali’s life and what follows is an emotional outburst. The impetus from this incident helps him gather nerve to try and reconnect with Gowri. I see it as a narrative tool plugged in to bring out the best in the protagonist's character.

The first half of Ulavacharu Biryani is filled with subtle portions of humor and the second half tries to open the faucets of tears for the audience, but ends up as an over-stretched effort to get things back in place. It's just in this zone, the film loses its steam. There it also staggers to set the right tone, as it borders on mature affliction and cheeky romance. 

Ulavacharu Biryani flourishes in the technical departments where camera'woman' Preetha creates an aura that’s reminiscent of the work of veteran cinematographer P C Sreeram. The sepia shots in the songs stand out and the entire cake making episode is glorified through her lens. My personal favorite was when Gowri passes her driving test where her expression gets captured through a GoPro shot coupled with an uplifting yet playful BGM. The color grading also helped a lot in painting the frames with the right tinge. 

The music of Ilayaraja fills all the blank spaces in the film. It punctuates every scene so effectively and covers up few plot holes, which otherwise glare out of the screen. The BGMs accompany every mood and accentuate even simple scenes. You can play a naming game and create a long list of tracks those can be used for scenes of realization, angst, proposal, confrontation, and many more. At places, you get a nostalgic feel of the 80s, and few scenes are garnished with techno, jazz and archetypal string arrangements of the Maestro. The background score is a treat for Raja’s fans.

While setting an emotive groove, Ulavacharu Biryani flushes out few shortcomings, which make the film unpalatable in some parts. The 'food' side of the story is barely visible after interval. On one side, the plot thickens and fizzles in no time, and on the other, the conflict between the lead characters arises and gets resolved towards the end without a proper cinematic justification. However, the magic and music of the film leaves a good taste to relish for making it a culinary consonance. 

My Rating: Expectation - 8/10; Reality - 6/10

This review was originally written for Metro India newspaper. 
An edited version of this piece can be found here.