Devara: Part 1

Villages on the coast live off smuggling by sea. Devara grew up inside that trade, a strong and respected man, and then at a certain point decides to stop it and turns against his own people. The narrative runs in two periods: the years of Devara's rule and the later stretch in which his son Vara grows up. The subject is not smuggling but fear as inheritance. To stop his people, Devara teaches them to be afraid of him; the son, unlike the father, is a coward, and the real tension is in what that difference means. The form is mainstream Telugu cinema at full scale: underwater fights, crowded festival sequences, slow-motion entrances and loud music. The sea here is not decor but an arena. Koratala Siva directs. N.T. Rama Rao Jr. appears in his first film after the international success of RRR. Saif Ali Khan crossed into Telugu cinema with this film, playing the antagonist Bhaira. As the title says, the production was split in two, so the narrative is left deliberately unfinished. Who it is for: viewers who like large-scale Indian action cinema. Who it is not for: anyone wanting closure; the film is built as preparation for a second part and its ending unties nothing.