Dhananjay and Moksh Kushal in ‘Koti’ | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement.
Parameshwara Gundkal’s first directorial venture featured him playing the lead role of Dhananjay. Category, Reminds you of simpler times. Kote prefers vintage ice candies over the exotic ice cream flavors available in the market today, his mother (played by Tara) listens to retro Kannada music on a tape recorder, and Kote himself is content with the childlike but firm belief of becoming rich without going the wrong way.
Kote, who lives in a fictitious city called Janta City, works as a cab driver and runs a packers and movers business with a truck borrowed from the city’s most dreaded goon Dinu Savakkar (Ramesh Indira as a formulaic villain). Kote’s world revolves around his two siblings and mother; a family man is a character that has always been loved by the people, but Dhananjay’s lovely acting keeps you hooked to his character.
Koti (Kannada)
Director: Parameshwar Gundkal
Mould: Dhananjay, Tara, Rangayana Raghu, Prithvi Shamanur, Ramesh Indira, Moksha Kushal
Runtime: 170 minutes
Plot: In his quest to earn honest money for his sister’s wedding, Kote encounters the powerful gangster leader Dinu Savakkar
Kote is also an interesting character as he sticks to his integrity despite facing many tempting situations to make money through shortcuts. Dhananjay has played the role of Kote brilliantly, proving why he is suitable to play a middle-class hero.
take the actor out of the movie, and Category It is a dull affair, with the plot taking a surprisingly long time to kick in. There are so many characters – a woman who is a thief, a corrupt police officer, a dreaded gangster, a greedy catering company owner and an ailing mother – that the sub-plots involving them disrupt the flow of the film. The frequent abrupt deviations from the main theme (the director believed he would connect all the dots in the end) also make us wonder about the ulterior motive of the film.
A scene from ‘Koti’ | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Director Parameshwar Gundkal has spent many years in the television industry, and the blueprint of a colourful soap opera drives his first foray into cinema. Take the film’s only major flashback involving Kote’s father; at a time when writers and directors are abandoning this concept in modern-day filmmaking, a backstory to justify the protagonist’s motives seems irrelevant.
Category It runs for almost three hours, and the runtime becomes a problem as many scenes are not full of energy. Except for Dhananjay’s presence, the family drama feels very generic, and the mother-son sentiment is stretched beyond the limits required for an engaging drama, reminding us of a TV serial.
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The extremely slow-paced screenplay is weakened by certain predictability (the outcome of the heroine’s marriage is easy to guess) or lengthy scenes attempting to establish the hero’s sincerity. Category The film’s central conflict is revealed too late. By then, you’re torn between admiring Dhananjay’s performance and trying to be patient with a plot that promises a grand finale… but doesn’t deliver.
Koti is currently showing in cinemas
