Film: ‘Punda’; Producer: Kuppu Swamy; Director: H. Vasu; Music: G.V. Prakash Kumar; Cast: Yogi, Meghana Raj, Sharat Lohithashwa, Petrol Prasanna and Avinash; Rating: **
Kannada film ‘Punda’ is the remake of Dhanush-Divya Spandana starrer ‘Polladhavan’ released some two years ago.
Yogi, the hero of ‘Punda’ has been acting in many remakes of films starring Tamil star Dhanush in recent days as both of them share a similar physicality and have been portraying middle class characters.
But the comparison ends there.
While Dhanush has built on his acting capabilities, Yogi still lags behind.
‘Polladhavan’ was an action entertainer which looked real and was strong on the technical front.
‘Punda’ director Vasu has been faithful to the screenplay of ‘Polladhavan’. To that extent, Vasu has succeeded in delivering a fast paced entertainer.
However Vasu should have also tried to offset the negative points of the original film which he has not done.
The story revolves around Yogi dreaming of getting a motorcycle. But his poor family cannot afford to get him one. Instead his father lends him some money to start a business, but Yogi prefers to get a secondhand motorcycle.
The rest of the story revolves around how his motorcycle gets stolen, and about his confrontation with underworld dons.
The dance and fight sequences in the film are quite entertaining. Yogi has done well in the action sequences, while Meghana adds a lot of sex appeal to the film.
Petrol Prasanna is another actor who has done well in the film. Sharath Lohithashwa, Avinash and Venkatesh have also given good performances in the film.
Cinemetographer Chandru has done a fantastic work behind the camera, while the tunes of original film have been lifted. Even the choreography style remains the same as the original film.
‘Punda’ is worth a watch once.
