Budget Padmanabham Review

We've got news, Mr. Lennon. Money can buy you love. Ask the heroine of this one. What's not news is that it can also buy you plenty of boredom. Ask the audiences of this film.

Krishna Reddy is a guy who believes that a cobbler should stick to his last, even if the trade is going out of fashion. Comedy family dramas brought him to the limelight and established him as one of the top shot directors in the Telugu film industry. It was because he arrived at a time when the middle class was craving for films that dealt with their problems. And he catered to their needs, though not in great style. But sadly, he treads the same old family values line with the same old narrative style, and doesn't innovate either on the script or on the presentation. The result? Two films, Sri Srimati Satyabhama and Sakutumba Saparivara Sametam, bomb consecutively. And this latest offering seems no better.

Budget Padmanabham is about a miser who will do anything to save money. He eats only one meal a day, and won't do anything that will involve spending. If he gives a lift to his colleagues he collects money from them. You wouldn't consider him to be one of those persons you would give an arm and a leg to associate with, but, strangely, Ramya (Ramya Krishna) not only likes him, she also falls deeply in love with him!

Padmanabham doesn't want to do anything with her, but when Ramya suggests that two salaries are better than one, he thinks it's a brilliant idea and marries her. So much for the institution. Now start the troubles: first, his sister Vijaya (Y Vijaya) and her husband Vaastu Subramanyam (L B Sriram) pile on to him, and then Ramya's good-for-nothing brother Ravi (Ravi Teja) also seeks shelter in their house. The worst, though, is yet to come for the grumbling Padmanabham: his wife gives birth to triplets.

The film is an entertainer upto this point. And L B Sriram and Ravi Teja treat you to some rip-roaring laughter. But Krishna Reddy doesn't know how to proceed hereon, and so he introduces a second heroine Sonali (Vidya) who comes to Padmanabham's house to look after the kids. And jealousy is aroused in Ramya, who starts treating her as a competitor rather than as a servant.

The film is a yawning bore from here. Krishna Reddy had better change his track if he doesn't want to end up as a footnote in the history of the Telugu film industry, and that for having made the most number of boring family dramas.