Pushpa: The Rise-Part 1

Pushpa: The Rise-Part 1 (2021)

Runtime: 179 minutes (not a misprint)

Directed by: Sukumar

Starring: Allu Arjan, Fahada Faasil, Rashmika Mandanna, Jagadeesh Prathap Bandari, Sunil

From: Mythri Movie Makers/Muttamsetty Media

It was time for me to finally see another Indian movie. Considering that several of my mutuals from Letterboxd are from India or are South Asian in heritage and live elsewhere, I really should explore that vast world which I’ve barely scratched the surface of. Its availability on Prime, praise for at least one of its action scenes I read in an article recently, a description of the movie that someone on Twitter said was “Scarface meets Popeye with wuxia” & it centers on the smuggling of red sandalwood trees… how could I not watch Pushpa?

I wish I could like the film more; after all, it has a musical number in the woods where guys sing about animals while carrying around axes. The biggest sin: the titular Pushpa is always a dick who I never warmed up to. At the very beginning, he quit his job for lousy reasons-upsetting his family that he is supporting; wanting to sit cross-legged and lounge around like he is a big shot when you had no reason to think that at that point-and in general it was unclear to me if I should even like this dude or not. Turns out, I never did even once the action moved to the forest. As that tree only grows in a small area of India, it is a prized commodity so naturally there is corruption involved both with the company in charge and local police officers. A random dude who has a man-crush on him (Keshava) becomes his BFF and there’s far more opportunities for rude stubborn behavior…

This is 3 hours long, although to echo a mutual, a reason why is that there is plenty of slo-mo action, and that action was as OTT-not to mention, hilarious at times-as expected. That, the general idea of the story, the music and its sometimes colorful nature are the reasons why this does not get a worse rating. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t disappointed with the end product and how I found the lead to be intolerable. What will be a demerit for many is that this belongs in the category of “the dog dies in the movie.”

As the Part 1 reveals, a Part 2 will be made so the ending is not definitive. I’ll pass on a Part 2… even if it is like Part 1 in displaying small warnings each time someone is shown drinking alcohol or smoking tobacco—I saw the same warnings when I watched the 2019 movie Kaithi on YouTube. As that was in the Tamil language and this is Telugu, it must be something that sometimes happens across all of Indian cinema. As Pushpa smokes as if he’s a Chow Yun-Fat character… that message appears often. All that said, for the rest of 2023 I’ll try to watch cinema from this country more than once in a blue moon.