Devara Part 1 is about action, action—and more action!

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Trust the South folks to indulge in excess of hero-worship. Devara: Part 1 is a testosterone-heavy drama that believes in an extravaganza of action like few films even from there. On the plus side, the original tweaks that come within a familiar template make me awestruck in a way, partly because their filmmakers’ Hindi counterparts have not even taken off from their starting posts in the race between Hindi and (especially) Telugu cinema.

The result? Devara Part 1 is said to have had a Rs. 275 crore opening weekend gross, beating even The Transformers, while the Hindi film industry is crowing only over one super-hit in the first nine months of 2024!!

Consider the double-role trope. Classically, we have two varieties of dual roles, one where the two come face-to-face, and one where they do not. Within these two templates, we get everything else: one old, one young / father-son, one rich-one poor, one evil-one good, one mild-one wild and so on. This time, Devara the father (NTR Jr.) never gets to meets Vara, the grown-up son who is his spitting image, but is very mild-natured—up to a point, of course.

They all live in a fishing village, one of four adjoining hamlets where they all unite to rob ships of contraband but also compete for an annual ritual of a puja of weapons, where the victor village gets them. Of course, the larger-than-life Devara is their uncrowned leader and Bhaira (Saif Ali Khan) the meanie.

We also have the corrupt cop and businessman (read arms dealer) clichéd clique who drive a good part of their lives. Then Devara realizes that the two of them are conning them into anti-national acts. He rules that they will not cooperate. The villagers docilely obey Devara, but Bhaira fumes instead and plots to kill Devara, and almost succeeds.

A lot happens during all this, and even more later, and finally, when we know that Devara is no more (No! That’s not a spoiler!), the film uncovers its ace cliffhanger into Devara: Part 2 in the best tradition of Bahubali: “Why has this noble soul, close to Devara, killed him?”

Amidst all this, purely ornamental or less roles are played by women, like Devara’s aging mother (Zarina Wahab) who replicates the Nirupa Roys and Durga Khotes of old Hindi films, the sharp seer (Rameshwari Talluri), the docile Mrs. Devara (Shruti Marathe), the lusty maiden who is after Vara (Janhvi Kapoor) and the pitiable village woman (unknown actress), who loses her son and makes Devara reform.

The mother-son angle, the betrayals, the Kantara and more-like display of weird village rituals—the film goes the whole hog in 177 minutes but fortunately never drags. The cinematography is nuanced (R. Rathnavelu) and A. Sreekar Prasad (editing), Sabu Cyril (production design) and background score (Anirudh Ravichander) also match the gargantuan scale.

Koratala Siva excels at concocting his story and screenplay and directs with aplomb. Kausar Munir’s Hindi dialogues are alright.

And NTR Jr. is the life of the show. He plays to the gallery without overdoing it and gets a perfect foil in the rogue Saif Ali Khan, whose villainy is getting better and better (read more and more effortlessly evil!). Go out for a smoking break during the NTR Jr.-Janhvi Kapoor song, and you will miss half the screen time she has. From the rest, Shrikant as Rayappa and Sudev Nair as Kunjara’s son are impressive.

Among the South Indian theatrical releases in Hindi, Devara: Part 1 is easily the most entertaining, even if also perhaps one of the bloodiest: even Devara’s final message to his people is written in his enemies’ blood on the rocks on a beach! P.S.: I watched the brilliant Maharaja only on OTT.

Rating: ***1/2

Yuvasudha Arts & NTR Arts’ Devara: Part 1 Produced by: Sudhakar Mikkilineni, Kosaraju Harikrishna & Nandamuri Kalyan Ram  Directed by: Koratala Siva  Written by: Koratala Siva & Kausar Munir (Hindi dialogues) Music: Anirudh Ravichander  Starring: NTR Jr., Saif Ali Khan, Janhvi Kapoor, Shrikant, Narayan, Zarina Wahab, Shruti Marathe, Murali Sharma, Prakash Raj, Shine Tom Chacko, Rameshwari Talluri, Sudev Nair, Tarak Ponnappa & others