Neelambari Review

A moonlit night, an eerie place, scary legends of scarier women... be prepared to be scared out of your wits with Neelambari. The only problem is that the fear doesn't arise from any of the above factors. It's from some other more pressing issues: wooden-faced actors from the Kannada film industry, Ramya Krishna disguised as a whale in tribal costume (or vice versa), tantriks and graphics that are both totally out of place, and a storyline that could be used to create the Indian version of Tomb Raider... need I say more?

This movie is being hailed as something of a victory for the Kannada film industry, which doesn't say much about it. A story lifted from the ancient legend of Neelambari, graphics that could have been lifted from the original Duke game, and costumes... well, the lesser said of the costumes, the better.

Let's give you a brief idea of the story. "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned," said several learned persons, and this movie takes a tedious three hours to prove that. The only problem is that the scorn-fury sequence is carried a bit too far here. With two formidable ladies here, the sequence looks like scorn-fury-scorn-fury-scorn-fury-scorn-fury... you get the point.

Now let's go back where we started from. Moonlit night, eerie place, etcetera etcetera. The incredible hulk enters (read Neelambari aka Akhila Sriram aka Ramya Krishna) - a mysterious woman who has her hands raised to the fury of nature, doing sacrifices to carry out an ancient vendetta. And what may the reason be?

Another hulk Neela (Charulatha) has killed her and her beau Veera (Suman). All this happens after a series of body-possessing and the like. Instead of being thankful (once you see Suman in the movie, you'll realize the relevance of that "thankful"), the lady comes back to life, suitably enraged, and then follows the clash of the titans.

To fill in the gaps, you have cops (one of them being the Kannada actor Devaraj), tantriks, other animals, graphics (read curses), graphics (read transfigurations and metamorphoses) and more graphics (read credits). No snakes here, people, as Neelambari, like the posters proclaim, is different "just for a change".

It ain't different enough, and if Ramya Krishna doesn't start fighting that bulge and continues with those ambitious dance steps, the Richter scale isn't gonna be enough either.