One of the most prolific directors working in India has to be Ram Gopal Varma. Never mind his detractors, and never mind the painful fact that he has more misses than hits, his classics like Satya, Rangeela, Company, Shiva, Bhoot, Sarkar etc. ensure that he can never simply be ignored by our collective consciousness.
However, there is (was?) one more RGV, that was fun-loving and experimental. Testaments to that include his forays into cult comedy and horror, for example, Raat, Kaun, Anaganaga Oka Roju, Madhyanapu Hatya, and (to an extent), even Naach. However, he had made a gem of a movie that just so happened to be his sophomore effort, that most of the audience didn't know how to digest, since they all (me included, I confess) were expecting another 'Shiva'. It was called 'Kshana Kshanam', or 'Every moment'.
I watched this in my 11th grade when one of the marketing gigs read 'first Telugu movie in 4-track stereo sound'.
At the time, I had not watched many movies (period) of Venkatesh (the leading man), but Sridevi was one heroine that was every teen's fantasy at the time, hot from her memorable roles in Mr. India, Chaalbaaz, Jagadeka Veerudu Atiloka Sundari et al (even crap like Roop ki Rani Choron ka Raja), that those in Hyderabad got to watch both her regional potboilers as well as her forays in Hindi cinema.
Fresh off the success of 'Shiva' (that cult + mainstream classic that's yet to be bettered), the audience might have expected something similar (Shiva was one of the best action movies with a college based theme, and realistic characterization and filming styles, that had taken Tollywood by storm 2 years previous to this).
I also was mildly disappointed that it was not Nagarjuna who was starring in this one as well, and did not know if Varma could pull of a commercial potboiler (that the marketing dept had promised).
This one begins with a small-time bank robbery, that goes wrong progressively as the plot progresses, involving a small-time thief and a regular middle-class single working woman. Overwhelmed by what's happening around them, they each take refuge in the other's deception, and try to find a way out of the mess they seem to be getting into. Without revealing plot details further, that set-up is like the perfect take-off point for one heck of a merry-go-round-and-round, rivaling its 'inspiration', Romancing the Stone (in my opinion, not as good as this one). One more thing - the final train sequence has not been bettered, and this is NOT one of those movies with bulls$!t stunts in its repertoire.
Though Goddess Sridevi was the cynosure of all eyes (and ears), Paresh Rawal's turn as a sometimes-bumbling bad guy (his best work so far) threatens to overshadow her best work, and its fantastic to watch their characters play off the other in each and every scene they inhabit, with Venky surprisingly lending solid support to both. Sridevi's natural acting (her character's natural responses to the situations she finds herself thrown into), Venkatesh's excellent (vastly underrated) turn as the perfect foil to Sridevi (now i can't imagine Nagarjuna in this role, though his flair for comedy has improved over the years); the various locations used for filming; Rami Reddy's role as the bloodhound cop with a permanent deadpan expression...I could go on and on about this one, but all the above make this movie a definite cut above the usual Tollywood formulaic trash, and Varma has not made a better movie in the same genre since '91 (he did try with Daud, which went wrong, in my opinion, due to his fixation with the Matondkar lass, that he forgot to pay any attention to his screenplay).
Anukokunda Oka Roju, was its closest genre-companion, and is good on its own merits (Charmy doing a Sridevi in this one, with a fantastic Jagapathi Babu as the scene-chewing cop investigating.....more on that some other time).
Hope they continue to make movies like these, and hope RGV can have some fun doing this and get out of the epic movie remakes. Fingers crossed!
