Tholi Prema

First love is a memory for any of us. We are obliged to connect with a person good or bad at an young age and that can grow into a love. Such love is hard to to forget and if it is unrequitted, we may end up pining over it, for what appears to be an eternity. Such kind of romance is not new to Telugu screen but if it is delivered fresh, it will be a good one to watch. Is Tholiprema such a film?

Plot : Adithya (Varun Tej) is an impulsive smart person who cares for that moment more. He finds Varsha (Raashi Khanna) on a train journey and looses himself for her beauty. He likes her so much that until she is able to give him a positive response he keeps pursuing her all through the journey.

But on the next morning, after reaching the destination, she doesn’t even reply anything about his proposal. While he starts searching for her for three months, she appears in his college. As she is a girl who fears consequences and thinks twice and he us highly impulsive, their romance becomes a short-lived affair. But both fail to move on and meet in London, after six years. What happens next and how they confront their differences and work past them forms the rest of the story.

Performances : Varun Tej started understanding the difference between extremely hyper and low of energy on screen. He looked more poised and in-character throughout the film. He seemed confident of what he is doing and even improved his expressions, dance moves. He is on a right path and if he continues to experiment and pick meaty roles, he will be a star and good actor too.

Raashi Khanna after eons, got a meaty role and she sunk her teeth into it. She maintained the character of Varsha through out the movie. This is like a career-defining movie and role for her. If she continues to choose her next films wisely, she will be a popular actress and star for sure.

Suhasini, Naresh showed their sincerity in the small roles by making a huge impact. Hyper Aadi and Priyadarshi brought the house down.

Technicalities : George C Williams, is a good cinematographer and when he gets a chance to experiment, he can be a great help to the film. In a romance, it is important that the film looks fresh and has some good visual imagination to let us really appreciate the proceedings. He understands the requirements well and delivered fine visuals.

Naveen Nooli, the editor of the film, had to be very careful with the pacing of the film. He did not really let the pace fall but his work could have been better in the first hour.

Music is the backbone of this movie and SS Thaman after a long time got an opportunity to score for a complete romantic film. He did give his best and lyricist Sri Mani, helped him as well.

Writer and Director, Venky Atluri did a good job in re-imagining a cliched love story. He infused many common scenes with fresh attitude and lead-pair chemistry helped him well enough. The writing is very good in the college scenes and in marriage setup in the second half as well. But in-between the very good sequences he did fell flat in few sequences here and there. He seemed to have great influence of Yash Chopra and Aditya Chopra romances but found good balance and originality as well.

Analysis : The movie is a good nostalgic ride for all the young first time lovers. As first love becomes an unconquerable dream in most of the peoples lives, we tend to accept the pain and live with it. These kind of films really bring out such memories back into our routine lives. All send and done, the film does suffer with predictable screenplay but overcomes that obstacle with formidable execution.

Rating : 3/5