‘Modern Masters: SS Rajamouli’ movie review: An enjoyable, informative journey of a game changer

From ‘Fashionable Masters: SS Rajamouli’
| Picture Credit score: Netflix

A couple of minutes into the docu-film Fashionable Masters: SS Rajamouli, producer-director Karan Johar declares that in up to date Indian cinema, there is no such thing as a larger filmmaker than Rajamouli. The docu-film directed by Raghav Khanna and co-directed by Tanvi Ajinkya, now streaming on Netflix, ushers viewers into the happenings on the sidelines of the screening of RRR (Rise, Roar, Revolt) at TCL Chinese language Theatre, Los Angeles, the place the viewers cheers the larger-than-life leisure, as Rajamouli and others take within the reactions. A screening of RRR in Tokyo, Japan, elicits comparable euphoria. The documentary retraces the journey of Rajamouli, whose movies Baahubali and RRR are globally celebrated, to know what made him the preferred Indian showman of our instances.

For many who have intently adopted Telugu cinema and the rise of Rajamouli, among the interviews featured within the documentary may appear acquainted, but, there is sufficient to chew on. Actors Prabhas, Rana Daggubati, NTR and Ram Charan supply insights into how Rajamouli is a stickler for element and settles for nothing lower than 100%. NTR describes Rajamouli as a born storyteller, whereas Ram Charan says that there are occasions when he views a Rajamouli movie like a 3rd individual, in awe, even when he has acted in it.

Choreographer Prem Rakshit, NTR Jr, Rajamouli and Ram Charan on the units of ‘RRR’
| Picture Credit score:
Netflix

Produced by Applause Leisure and Movie Companion Studios, Fashionable Masters has movie journalist and critic Anupama Chopra interviewing Rajamouli in Los Angeles and Tokyo, attempting to discover his mindset. Whereas Rajamouli calls himself a slave to storytelling and brushes apart the discuss of him being known as ‘India’s James Cameron’, the documentary will get James Cameron to weigh in and share his views on Rajamouli.

The documentary retraces Rajamouli’s journey from Kovvuru in Andhra Pradesh. Interviews along with his members of the family, together with his father and screenwriter Vijayendra Prasad, and older cousin and music composer M M Keeravani, supply insights into the director’s youth. Unseen images of the early years of Rajamouli and his members of the family, interspersed with anecdotes of how storytelling was an integral a part of rising up, lay the muse for the journey forward.

Rajamouli’s entry into the leisure business, from directing the tv serial Santhi Nivasam (1999) to creating his first characteristic movie, Pupil No. 1 (2001), serves because the backdrop to introduce us to the early journey of composer Keeravani and actor NTR Jr.

Lyricist Chandrabose and music composer M M Keeravani
| Picture Credit score:
Netflix

The documentary scores by weaving collectively the private {and professional} tales of Rajamouli and his members of the family, a lot of whom have taken on diversified tasks in filmmaking. Fashionable Masters tries to know what it entails for all of the members of the family to work collectively. Just a few lesser-known particulars additionally come to the fore. Rajamouli’s courtship along with his spouse Rama, the bond he shares along with his sister-in-law Srivalli, who’s a mom determine to the household, and the enjoyable particulars of a household trip humanise the story of the director.

Whereas Fashionable Masters celebrates Rajamouli, it doesn’t maintain again from addressing uncomfortable matters. How does the household cope with Rajamouli’s atheism? What does Rajamouli must say in regards to the criticism of casteism in Baahubali or the depiction of the romance between Shivudu (Prabhas) and Avantika (Tamannaah Bhatia)?

The enjoyable moments come from the behind-the-scenes footage that exhibits Rajamouli on the units of Magadheera, Baahubali and RRR, the place he enacts not solely the emotional scenes but additionally the motion scenes, strapped in harnesses. There are info nuggets as nicely. Do you know that Magadheera (2009) was the primary Telugu movie to have a visible results supervisor in its title credit?

Going past discussing the dimensions of Rajamouli’s movies, the docu-film touches upon how he understands the foundations of cinema, solely to interrupt them. A living proof is a scene in Eega. The anecdote additionally serves to elucidate the place Rajamouli scores over different filmmakers who aspire to match his scale and imaginative and prescient — in placing forth a story that establishes an emotional reference to the viewers.

The one-hour 14-minute lengthy movie serves as an introduction to Rajamouli and his movies for a worldwide viewers, acknowledging his greatest movies equivalent to Magadheera, Eega, Baahubali and RRR, whereas it doesn’t talk about his different blockbuster Telugu hits equivalent to Yamadonga, Chatrapathi or Vikramarkudu. Maybe there might have been a minimum of a passing point out of those movies and the truth that the filmmaker has not had a single field workplace setback, to present a extra healthful perception into the fimmaker’s success.

Fashionable Masters: SS Rajamouli is at the moment streaming on Netflix