I may be biased since this movie takes place in my home city of Hyderabad,AP in Southern India.The western(esp US) viewer may be bewildered that the film is about political rivalries in college as is very much the case in most parts of India esp my state.One can draw a vague parallel to the student movements of the sixties in U.S.Now if u can ...politicize them even more,strip them of any socially redeeming value and make them a ruthless power hungry grab for turf and dont forget to place in India of the late 80's where the youth are slowly but steadily realizing the sterility of Gandhi's nonviolent policies which had for long enough demoralized the nation and was witnessing the slow and painful death of his beloved dynastic,tyrannical regime of Congress(I). That being said.This is Varma's first film made when he was in his mid 20's.The violence in this film is excruciatingly brutal and graphic.Like the scene where a rival gang proceeds to systematically bash a student leader head with hockey stick and finishes the act by smashing his face on a rock.Another student's face was sliced in half by an axe.Nagarjuna who stars as shy newcomer turned student leader turned mobster is nothing short of brilliant.His eyes wonderfully express his cold ruthless fury.Not to be upstaged is his psychotic nemesis Bhavani portrayed eerily by Raghuvaran.The ending is kinda disturbing but is good because its uncompromising and refrains from a feel good sort of sentiment so prevalent in Indian films. Also this film was kind of a pioneer in technical acheivement esp in sound and photography.It was similar to other films of the seventies and eighties in the sense that it was action film with a social message.But rarely have films with the exception of Satya(also by Varma) get any dark and intense than this.What I find this esp disturbing is that now its mostly love stories ,'family values' and assorted chick flicks that get the most award and box office returns.These are dark days for our film industry!!
