As a child actor he shared his father’s superstardom. On screen, little Mahesh Babu could do whatever his father did. In fact he could do more, he danced well too!
Cut to later 90s, Mahesh Babu was launched with Raja Kumarudu under the dream combination of the then number one producer-director combination of Ashwini Dutt and K.Raghavendra Rao. The film was strictly ok, and what Mahesh offered was nothing new but an extension of his child roles. He had looks, performance, good body language but something was missing. No novelty, ie nothing what other heroes of this generation could not do.
The career of Mahesh coincided with the rise of two other stars, Pawan Kalyan and Jr NTR. In fact they put him back by giving continuous hits. Mahesh acted in several ordinary films therefore he did not exactly join the top league. Then followed Krishna Vamsi’s ‘Murari’. Mahesh’s performance in the last half an hour of the film shocked the audience as they watched for the first time what Mahesh is not known for, ‘intensity’. Though Murari was successful it didn’t give Mahesh the badly needed block buster.
Then came ‘Okkadu’. A sheer thrill ride, it had the best technical values ever seen in Telugu film industry and one of the best villain roles in a long time that of Obul Reddy by Prakash Raj and superb direction by Guna Sekhar. But what made Okkadu so memorable is Mahesh’s performance . His character was a mixture of juvenile arrogance, humor and dare delivery. He played it with extreme intensity which took movie to another level. His style of underplaying his characters is a new experience to the audience. Mahesh has arrived!
He followed it up with a knockout performance in ‘Nijam’. Audience loved watching boyish looking Mahesh exploding on screen in the scenes leading to Interval.
Athadu by any standards is a lovable film but didn’t get its due at the box office. His character of the assassin in hiding, who speaks less, required him to do underplay and that is what he is good at. There were comments that he overplayed his underplay. Especially in the scene in which he reveals his love to Trisha, his performance was too underplayed.
The combination of Puri and Mahesh proved to be explosive with Pokiri. The hero characterization in the film is typical of Puris Heros ,but what made it extraordinary is Mahesh performing it , with a dash of recklessness, sarcasm in dialogues and a dashing body language. Considered as one of the best mass hero characterizations of all time, MB created a new prototype of the hero character for others to follow.
Audience said he lacked in comedy. A hero can be called a genuine superstar only if he can do comedy well. Be it the Big B or Chiranjeevi, they are so comfortable doing comedy. Mahesh tried comedy in films like Nani. But he never took his comedy seriously. His attempt at comedy in a drunken scene in Athidi was least impressive.
In Khaleja, Trivikaram Srinivas provided the litmus test. He made Mahesh do comedy. It is not easy to hook on to Trivikarm’s comedy timing and his kind of dialogues. Mahesh did it with ease and it was delight to watch Mahesh in the scenes teasing Anushka. Khaleja is remembered only for those scenes. But the best form of the Prince is yet to come.
And it came in the form of Dookdu. In this film Prince is a revelation! His role is a perfect mix of all shades. There is action, sentiment, romance, and of course, tremendous comedy! His comedy timing is simply perfect. Doing comedy beside Brahmanadam and MS and not being dominated is not an easy task. There is also the risk of overacting in comedy, but Mahesh came out with flying colors. And that’s what made an average film a block buster. And that’s what superstars are expected to do.
What actually makes Mahesh special is, whatever he does he fills it up with a lot of intensity and believability. He has unique dialogue delivery which is neither dramatic nor flat but very effective. He brings honesty to his roles and that’s why audience love to watch him irrespective of anything else.
In the process of his evolution as a complete actor he set a new bench mark for his contemporaries, especially the other star-sons. They need to sweat it out to compete with him. But so far he is the only hero who is fast leaving his superstar father in his own shadow. Wish he would continue bang the box office and bring smile to the audience and producers as well.
Post a Comment