We all have our own guilty pleasures. The movie might be a huge bomb at the box-office or the movie itself might not be the best movie ever and we ourselves know that. But we watch the movie again and again just for the moments which provide us with maximum entertainment. Over all these years, I have observed that Karunakaran is one of those rare directors in the industry who can really make complete family entertainers that have a huge rewatchable factor. I don't say that he is not without flops, but he a very clever filmmaker. And in 2008, he surprised us with “Ullasanga Utsahanga” which became a hit back then and still stands out as the one of the most entertaining movies from the director who gave us evergreen entertainers like Tholi Prema and Darling. You will get what I am trying to say in the next few lines.
1. Turning it's flaws into strengths A mata ki aa mate cheppukunte, we know that both the hero and the heroine are not really great actors. We can see that both their face expressions are very limited and even sometimes the lip-sync doesn't even match with the dialogue we hear. But guess what? The movie completely embraces this fact and makes the most out of it. We laugh whenever our hero laughs or smiles awkwardly showing all his teeth despite knowing that it is terrible. And it's not just once, but throughout the movie this one thing makes us laugh. Even the heroine's acting is on the same level, her expressions are same in anger, sadness or happiness. Our audiences don't excuse any actor even if their acting is slightly bad, but by the end of the movie, we love them? How is that possible? That is where Karunakaran's intelligence comes into play.
First of all, both the actors were newcomers in the industry. So there are no huge expectations from the audience. So the writers use this to crack as many jokes as possible on the hero's character making him represent the average guy. He begs, pleads or tricks his mom and vadina to get money which are exactly our daily struggles when we don't have a job. We all have that gang of friends/one special friend whom we use to the max to get a girl's attention. And most importantly, we do everything and anything when it is our first love, even if it is very stupid. All that jokes involving our hero establishes that this guy is the every normal guy in us.
If the heroine was introduced directly during her meeting with the hero, then the movie would've been a disaster. In order to avoid that, the movie itself starts with a back story of the heroine's childhood telling us that it will be the heroine's story rather than unlike the regular formula.
2. Clever Cameos In any comedy movie, any amount of repeat can be suicidal to the story. If Ullasanga Utsahanga's comedy only involved the hero, his friends and his parents, the audiences would be bored since this set up has been done a million times before. In order to keep us laughing throughout the length of the movie, we are given cameos from established comedians. Bramhanandam as the colony president, Sunil as hero's bava Malli Babu, Venu Madhav as Malli Babu's cheating friend, Dharmavarapu Subramaniam as a husband who is constantly abused by his wife, help keep the comedy fresh and flowing in the movie.
But arguably the most iconic joke of the movie comes from Sahadevudu's “Saroja...Oddu Saroja!” I am sure everyone is surprised that three words can make us laugh so hard. It is so funny that it becomes a joke within the movie itself where the hero uses to make the heroine laugh. Since the movie does not have the star power in the lead actors, it smartly makes the full use of the star comedians in the movie.
3. Constant Misleading: Many of the fans were angry when they came to know that the most of the first half in Darling was totally a lie. But this story tool wasn't new to Karunakaran who uses the constant misleading in Ullasanga Utsanga every half an hour. The movie is titled “Ullasanga Utsahanga” but it starts with a tragic and sad back story of a little girl's troubled childhood. The hero is told a lie that the heroine is suffering from memory loss in order to get rid off him. The heroine goes on a wild adventure to find her childhood love only to learn that she has been completely betrayed by the man servant she trusted so much. All these tricks feel really harsh.
But Karunakaran doesn't make us feel bad by following it up satisfying pay offs. At the beginning, when we see the title appear on the screen immediately after the depressing story of Dhana Laxmi and Balaji, audiences get a feeling that something is going wrong. But at the exact time, we see the colorful world of our hero and his funny antics. So we forget the early sadness due to the sillyness after the titles.
Second, when the hero learns that he was lied about the heroine's memory loss, he is very angry at everyone. Instead of going for the full-on drama, the writers use our hero's frustration for some more jokes like his vadina saying, “Dhana Laxmi kakapothe neeku 7th class pass ayina ammayi kuda dorakadu ra.” Though this is not much of a twist, it helps us to connect with the hero's character even more. The final twist that the entire Balaji sequence was planned by Dhana Laxmi's step-mother feels harsh on the heroine. But it is turned into a joke when our leads are given a lift by the original Balaji in the final scene of the movie.
Ullasanga Utsahanga is not a perfect movie nor does it revolutionize the cinema formula. But it is one of those best-case scenario where a standard story is executed very intelligently to win over the audience. And it does win over us because we can watch any number of times with the entire family without getting bored. Adding to that, the freshness of the music from GV Prakash Kumar and lyrics from then new comer Anantha Sreeram are both fantastic. I love this movie for all it's silliness which dominates over it's weaknesses.
So, Ullasanga Utsahanga gurinchi mee opinion enti? Comment...Saroja... Comment!
