Now Premiering - Middle Class Melodies

Middle Class Melodies – Comedy and Drama are cooked up in delicious proportions which work for all.

A new style of film-making and subject has incepted into the South Indian Films – maybe thanks to Lijo Jose Pellisery. The Rustic Rumble with Exuberant actions of a Community of people is a genre on its own, ( Angamaly Diaries, Ee Ma Yau, Jallikattu, Palasa 1978, Falaknuma Das etc. ). Middle-Class Melodies conversely is less Rustic, suaver and desexualized ( in a good manner ) treatment of a subject on a similar note - Only to make it for a “Family Watch”.( though, at the climax there is a frenzy myriad of twists like in UMUR )

 

The Director Vinoth Anantharaju’s classily envisioned scenes are shot in a Dil Raju colour palette ( though not produced by him ), with people swearing just occasionally and emotional sludges being replaced by free-flowing character-driven arcs. This is the biggest plus point, as the title itself suggests that it’s a story of/about us. We do swear occasionally but don’t gargle them in our mouth all the time ( do you? ). A middle-class life’s screenplay is slow but definitely unpredictable and inherently conjoined with Family. So, why take a route doped with wrist slitting plot twists?

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The makers understand their subject well. The comedy isn’t slapstick, it’s very clean and natural. Middle-Class Melodies is also a hyperlink story, in a very basic sense. The timelines are very much ours and the owning quality in our minds doesn’t take much time as the proceeding uncover one layer after another. If there is this owning quality, then why not inject them with heavy heartedness? The makers understand the subject so well that the heart-touching heavy episodes get regulated to just poke us by our gut and say “Shit happens!! And will always happen with these people “. There is a strong sense of holding back and playing low that makers do, just to keep the things light, merry and easygoing.

 

There are other minor factors which hold back too. Anand Devarkonda’s performance. Especially, in the dialogue delivery and diction of a character being portrayed as born and brought up in the core Guntur district. The Hyderabadi slang has gotten over him and we can see him continuously try for avoiding that tone and getting into the right shoes. ( Same goes with his elder brother Vijay Devarkonda in Dear Comrade ) Varsha Bollamma’s performance is appreciable because she dubbed for the voice though not knowing the language. She does look very convincing with her acting. Emoting through the Eyes is back in Telugu Cinema. The movie is benefitted from the good casting of remaining characters, the fresh faces only let you see the roles they play and that’s where the real triumph is.

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Goparaju Ramana’s Kondalrao is, at first glance, the very textbook version of an Agitated Father ( like Samuthakarani’s role in VIP/Raghuvaran Btech ), and next to fall for this type-casting. But, there is a twist in the embodied figure of Kondalrao, the Tantrums persist, but with more grounded sense. The very grounded sense of being an innocent village man who cannot see the forthcoming day with his intellect. The acting and dialogue delivery is just splendid. The scene of Father’s Realization, which again is a cliché, is very subtly expressed. There is no earth-shattering transformation that takes place ( yes, it’s 7G Brindavan/Rainbow Colony Scene that I just coined unknowingly ), but a very sweet moment of rejuvenation and reconciliation from Food.

 

Watch Middle-Class melodies for its subject treated well with clarity as it makes the Family time worthwhile for harmless fun and overcoming the drooping standards for having some. This quality isn’t available elsewhere in a movie of recent times.