Shirdi Sai Movie Review

Behind the Movie Shirdi Sai: Nagarjuna essaying the character of Shirdi Sai and Raghavendra Rao delaing a devotional subject with Keeravani’s music already a hit, what more do we require for ‘Shirdi Sai’ to get a hype before release. Finally, movie has graced the theatres and Sai devotees everwhere are rushing for the first tickets. Let us see, how far this ‘Shirdi Sai’ succeeded? In the Movie Shirdi Sai: Movie starts with Abhishekam of Sai Baba and thus gets into the story. A young lad with serene look comes to Shirdi to preach the religion of Love. While village priest Mahalsapati (Sharath Babu) and few others believe in him, it’s the village head cum money lender Bhatia (Sayaji Shinde) can’t accept the boy and is thrown away from Shirdi. The boy reaches Himalayas to learn the summary of various religions under his guru Venkusa. The boy grows up to become Fakir Baba (Nagarjuna) and again comes back Shirdi where he is named as Sai Baba by Mahalsapati.
However Bhatia always conflicts with Baba even when entire village believes a God in him. Episodes of Chand finding his lost Horse, Lakshmi Babi offering the daily food to Baba, Nanavali (Sai Kumar) sighting almighty in Baba, Baija Bai sharing a sisterly relation with Baba, Baija Bai’s son Tatiya (Kaushik) developing a special bond with Baba, Hawaldar Dasu Ganam (Srikanth) becoming the devotee of Baba, Lord Krishna’s admirer Sundari Bai (Kamalini Mukherjee) perceiving Krishna in Baba and Baba using Khanda Yogam (tearing his own body into pieces) against Bhatia closes the first half. All these form the miracles shown by Sai Baba and how people trustes him as a God.
Into the second half, Baba’s soul leaves his body for 72 hours and then comes back. Around the same time, British General Lord Wales (Sreehari) too realizes the powers in Baba. Freedom Fighter Bala Gangadhar Tilak (Ashok Kumar) getting the assurance from Baba on the entry of Gandhi into Indian freedom will take the story to next level. Climax arrives when Tatiya suffering from a deadly disease is saved while Baba lives his soul once for all.
Values of the Movie Shirdi Sai: The basic concept imbibed in the movie was ‘Sai Thathvam’ and his principles of life. ‘Sab Ka Malik Ek,’ ‘Serve the Mankind with Love’ and ‘Shraddha aur Saburi’ are the three pillars on which KRR has built the film. As movie runs in bits and espidoes, screenplay demanded further more. Cinematography by Gopal Reddy was so polished and could not exactly elevate the mood needed for this kind of concept. Dialogues by Paruchuri Brothers are good. Music by Keeravani as usual stood as lifeline for the film. Especially the songs of ‘Okkade Devudu, Saranu Saranu, Nee Padamula’ are well executed on screen. Production quality of Mahesh Reddy and Sai Krupa Entertainments were just okay.
Performance wise, Nagarjuna lived into the character. His body languge was well suited for Baba and second half was a better show from him. Dialogues and attitude wise Nag could have further taken more inputs from KRR as audience took their own sweet time to digest Nag as Sai. Later on during the climax stages, Nagarjuna performance reaches the peak and you will start tremendously feeling a divine light in his eyes. Sarath Babu, Sreehari, Sayaji Shinde, Kaushik, Kamalini Mukherjee, Rohini Hattangadi, Tanikella Bharani, Brahmanandam, Ali, Anant etc have done well.
Out of the Movie Shirdi Sai: The best condition one should keep for themselves before watching ‘Shirdi Sai’ is get into the mood of spirituality and don’t let to see hero Nagarjuna or director KRR, feel the movie with heart and soul. While the overall concept of Sai Thathavm is fine, Raghavendra could have still done a better job than this. As a movie, this will appeal to Shirdi Sai devotees but analysing it from critics point of view, it lacks in all the departments. Neither there was convinction nor there was grace. However, overall one will get the satisfaction of having watched an okay movie in-toto.
Given the budget and mediocre grandeur created on screen, ‘Shirdi Sai’ can be a commercially viable venture. On the other side, audiences will easily flow down to theatres with bliss-ful expectations to watch the miracles and life of Sai Baba.
Verdict of the Movie Shirdi Sai: Purely Devotional.
Rating :2.75/5