Daggaraga Dooramga – Extremely Predictable | Daggaraga Dooramga movie review

Release date: 26 August 2011

Rating : 2.25/5

Director :  Ravi Kumar Chavali

Producer : J Sambhasiva Rao

Music Director :Raghu Kunche

Starring: Sumanth , Vedhika, Bramanandam and others

Sumanth’s latest film Daggaraga Dooramga is about how a guy finds himself in trouble when a model he creates on his computer comes alive in real life. Vedhicka C Kumar played the lead role in this action love story which touches upon themes like love and terrorism. Directed by Ravi Kumar Chavali, the film was produced by J Sambasiva Rao and the makers touted that it’s a sensible film. Let’s see if the film lives up to its promise.

What’s the story: Gautham (Sumanth) is a creative director at Rainbow Advertising Agency. He impresses his boss and clients with his creative concepts. During one assignment, when he doesn’t come across the perfect face he wants, he ‘creates’ a new face on his computer thanks to ‘Photoshop’. His creation a rage in the market and he calls her Kamakshi. However, he doesn’t realize that there’s a girl named Meenakshi (Vedhicka) who looks exactly like Gautham’s creation. Elsewhere, a group of terrorists plan to create mayhem in Hyderabad and a journalist, Zarina (Sindhu Tholani) tries to investigate this entire issue. The rest of the story is about how Gautham, Meenakshi and Zarina’s lives intertwine which results in a cat-and-mouse chase.
Daggaraga Dooramga is an interesting concept to begin with. Probably the only original thing which the film even attempts is the hero creating a new face on his computer only to realize later on that she actually exists. However, the moment the story shifts to terrorists, the film moves on extremely predictable lines. The characters are clichéd that except for scheming to blow up railway stations and killing people, these terrorists do not show any intelligence. Even their dialogues seem to be ripped off from kazillion other stories based on terrorists.
Another problem with the story is it packs in too many things and it seems implausible for the timeline it is based in. On one hand, there are people running for their lives, yet the lead characters find time to interact and get to know each other, which eventually blossoms into a love story. And on the other hand, Jhonny (Brahmanandam) joins the chaos all of a sudden to provide comic relief. The screenplay goes for a toss as the terrorists keep aside their plans and indulge in ‘comedy’ with Jhonny. The major crux of the story, about why it’s wrong to kill innocent people, moves on predictable lines with random people screaming about teaching terrorists a lesson. The biggest drawback of the film is its lack of engaging drama and slow pace with songs popping at odd occasions.
Sumanth tries hard to capture the mood of the story as it swings from a romcom to an action thriller; however, there’s absolutely no intensity in his characterization. He looks more helpless and too smitten to come across the girl of his imagination rather on concentrating on how to solve a problem. Vedhicka exudes great charm but with so much chaos throughout the film, she hardly has a chance to make a good impression. Sindhu Tolani’s role is short-lived and even she looks clueless in her role. None of the other characters including Raghu Babu, Krishna Bhagavan and Satyam Rajesh stand out either.
Technical Departments : The film has couple of beautiful compositions by Raghu Kunche including the title track, which is one of the very few good things in the film. T Surendar Reddy’s cinematography leaves a lot to be desired. Digital Intermediate (DI) is poor and the whole film lacks a cinematic feel. The screenplay is too predictable to make any impression. Ravi Kumar Chavali could have done a much better job in creating compelling characters rather than treating the whole affair so superficially.
Bottomline : It’s amazing how the whole issue of terrorism and its treatment in films hasn’t changed for the past two decades. The cardboard characterization of terrorists, discussion of ‘Jihad’ and some good people who put nation first before religion have been part of almost every other film which is based on terrorism. Maybe it would be a good thing if our filmmakers stay away from such clichés if they don’t have anything specific or new points to make. As far as this film is concerned, there’s hardly a thing which shines in the entire film. Maybe it desperately requires some photoshopping skills to get the desired effect