Krishna and His Leela

When was the last time a Telugu mainstream film dealt with topics like live-in relationship and pre-marital sex without getting into preaching mode? Here’s a film that tells us it’s ok to be in a complicated relationship and it’s normal to have feelings for multiple women at the same time. It would’ve been problematic had the film tried to normalize or glorify this behaviour. Thankfully, Ravikanth and Siddhu Jonnalagadda, who also doubles up as the writer, know how to deal with the protagonist’s emotional problem without making him look like a creep. There’s also a mature sup-plot involving Krishna and his estranged father.

Director Ravikanth Perepu’s film is like fresh air after a nice rain. It’s breezy and puts things in perspective. A deep look at the film, one could find ourselves in the shoes of Krishna or Sathya or Radha. We’ve all been there, torn between two people. Confused about what or who is good for us. Sceptical about our future. Krishna and his Leela is as realistic as it gets. Nowhere in the film has the director tried to make issues glossier. Be it infidelity or the broken father-son relationship, the film teaches us that a dialogue will resolve the biggest of the problems. The climax, however, looked quite convenient, especially in the portions where Krishna ponders over his life in Ladakh. We’ve seen too many heroes realising his mistakes on a journey to the mountains. But we can let that pass.

The myth-making names of the characters tell you half the story. Lord Krishna played the field, didn’t he? And where did that leave his faithful Radha? But this is no epic, it is the here and now, and our hero is human whose flesh is weak. Very. Ricocheting between two women, and lying through his teeth, is finally not something a real man does: Jonalgadda is believable as that fellow who moves from self-pity to feeling conflicted, and, most importantly, not smug about having his cake and eating it too. The two young women, Satya and Radha, are distinct, well-outlined characters, and have minds of their own, though you wish the script had given them a few more smarts in facing up to their two-timer. And a spirited third woman, Rukhsar (Kapoor) adds to the mix.