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Audio Release Stills Audio Songs Stills Trailers Video Songs Wallpapers		Home > Telugu Movie Reviews > Shiva 2006 'Shiva 2006' Will Be Forgotten Before 2007 APK | September 14, 2006 Rating: **1/2 (***** Very Good, **** Good, *** Fair, ** Average, * Bad) Cast: Mohit Alawat, Nisha Kothari, Suchitra Pillai, Shereveer Vakil, Dilip Prabhawalkar, Sajid, Zakir Hussain, Raju Mavani, Nagesh Bhonsle, Pankaj Jha, Ninad Kamat, Ranvir Shorey, Dinesh Lamba, Upyendra Limaye, Sanjeev Wilson, Ganesh Mayekar, Vinod Jayawant, Ram-Lakshman and Others. Action: Ram-Lakshman. Art: Aparna Sud. Cinematography: Amal Neerad. Dialogues: Kona Venkat. Editing: Amit Parmar & Nipun Gupta. Lyrics: Sirivennela Sitarama Sastry. Music: Ilayaraja. Story: Farhad & Sajid. Producer & Direction: Ramgopal Varma. Presenter: Ad Labs. Banner: RGV Film Factory. Release Date: 14th September, 2006. RGV's astounding debut movie 'Shiva' in Telugu, made in 1989 provided a new lease of life and instant stardom to Nagarjuna. It was a landmark movie in Telugu cinema and the dialogues, songs and action were imitated and paradied, copied but nothing was as good as the original-original for a Telugu movie. Shiva was a copy of the popular English movie Class of 1984. Still, 'History Lecture' and the cycle-chain fight have become cult for Telugu Land. After the debacle of 'James', Varma had to make the new Shiva-word has it that he wanted to show the director of 'James' (Rohit Jugraj) how a movie is made. The best that can be said for Shiva is that it is better than James, which was one movie a normal, sane person couldn't sit through without squirming in their seats. 17 years later, the original Shiva is any day better. Shiva 2006 as the title is in the Telugu version of the bilingual, is simply another movie with a few typical Varma characters, a 'Sarkar' hangover and the been-there-done-that action sequences with a few interesting (at most 3) scenes. And before it is forgotten, the songs are a rehash of Ilayaraja's old hits. Any good? 'Botany Paatamundhi' sounds better than 'Police Police'. Comparisons are inevitable, what with the title, the songs and the similarity in the characters of the leads. Plot Shiva (Mohit Ahlawat) is the good police officer, bent on doing his duty, while the rest of the police force, excluding his friends are all the villainous cops. This extends to the home minister who threatens him after Shiva punishes wrong-doers, some of them who work for all these high-profile officers. Shiva ends up arresting Bappu, a criminal-turned-politician and finishes his whole gang in a bid to un-corrupt the 'system' that the home-minister warns Shiva about. Story, screenplay and direction Cinegoers who watched the earlier Shiva remember the screenplay vividly. The songs, the approach, the attitudes and the characters were all fresh and new. Here, there is no establishment of any thing-about the backgrounds of characters or the villains, some of the things are so illogical and situations are created just to suit the writer. There are many loopholes in the movie-the screenplay (how does Shiva know where the damsel in distress is all the time, he just arrives there in the nick of time), the bonds-what is Shiva's henpecked brother doing in the movie and why do his friends resign with him, why does a criminal cum politician go underground when he is exposed without defending his stance among other things. Related Links Audio Release Stills Audio Songs Stills Trailers Video Songs Wallpapers There are some typical Varma-isms in the movie, those characters and incidents that occur only in a Factory movie. 'Kutney' is a 4 foot killer from Malaysia (who, by the way, arrives in a boat-makes little sense) who is good with the knife. Bappu, the namesake of what the nation called the Mahatma is a topi-clad typical Maharashtrian goon, who is the anti-thesis of Gandhi. The sycophantic constable with his weird laughing style, John (Shereveer Vakil) with his paan and surma, the two twin brothers (Ram-Lakshman) who engage in some fight sequences giving Shiva double-trouble and the shadowy fight sequence which fails to create an effect. There is willing suspension of disbelief, and it looks like somewhere the writer-director had doubts about the way the movie was shaping up and cut out some important scenes to make it more compact. It is compact, but at best illogical and at worst, most of the things are present only for the said 'effect' and have little to do with the screenplay. The first scene where John is involved in a gory murder is proof to that. Performances Mohit Ahlawat is good enough, but let's save him the comparison to the earlier Shiva's lead. He has a good body and for his credit, he's not stiff. Rajeev Kanakala has dubbed well, but the voice has not suited Ahlawat perfectly. Nisha Kothari is passable, but much better than she was in James. Upyendra Limaye (Bappu), the home-minister and all the other goons cum officers are nothing like what Raghuvaran was in the earlier Shiva. And who can forget Yadgiri of Shiva? There is one demented character in place of him-it offends Telugu Cinegoers who watched and loved the original. Please, Ramu, stop this! Songs Maestro Ilayaraja. But no, don't have too many expectations here. The rehashed songs are better in the original format. And the verdict is.. Nothing earth-shaking. And don't even compare it to the earlier Shiva, or even Satya-two of his best movies ever. Why would a film-maker want to remake his own movies? Desperation, perhaps. Varma's movies are known for their dark undertones and memorable characters, but after Bheeku Mhatre, there have been few others. A hardcore fan of his movies will appreciate Shiva, but only for the repeated action and killings, even those do not generate any fear or excitement-or even repulsion, which he specializes at. Realism has been thrown out of the window, and fiction has been replaced with illogical, understated events, left to the audience to make sense of. Shiva 2006 is merely passable.