'Orchestra Mysuru' review: Flaws apart, a good-enough festive gift

Orchestra Mysuru

Kannada (Theatres)

Director: Sunil Mysuru

Cast: Dileep Raj, Poornachandra, Mahesh Kumar, Rajalakshmi Murthy

Rating: 3/5

'Orchestra Mysuru' is the tale of an underdog's triumph over the mighty. The film is inspired by the lives of playback singers Naveen Sajju and Raghu Dixit, who is also the film's music director. Director Sunil Mysuru crafts a fairly satisfying watch on a middle-class man's dream of making it big.

Films 'small' in scale often appeal for support because they argue that "good cinema must always win". But for an informed viewer, it's not easy to differentiate between intent and nuance. Most of these films falter because they fail to execute their interesting ideas.

In the case of 'Orchestra Mysuru', some thought seems to have gone into making a film that speaks to you long after it's over. Several of its conflicts are sure to stimulate discussions. As for the viewing experience, there is an equal sense of excitement and exhaustion as you sit through this two-hour and 50 minutes musical drama.

The film is all over the place in the first 30 minutes. Director Sunil Mysuru struggles to strike a balance between setting up the backdrop (the orchestra culture in Mysuru), and establishing the protagonist's character (a budding singer). There is an attempt at humour, involving the hero's friend, but the result is awful.

Just when we are about to throw our hands up in disappointment, 'Orchestra Mysuru' finds its groove. In an interesting scene, Poorna (Poornachandra) meets his hero Naveen Raj (Dileep Raj), the star of the Mysuru orchestra scene at a traffic signal. When Poorna expresses his wish to become a singer, Naveen asks him to sing on the spot.

Poorna is taken aback and feels slightly embarrassed at this demand. That's when you find the film personal as most of us struggle or have struggled in life, trying to overcome daunting situations to get closer to our dreams.

The narration finds the much-needed consistency post that scene as Poorna joins Naveen's orchestra group. The politics involved in the field gives him a reality check. He is forced to be a background artiste but to his gang of friends from the colony, he lies about being a rising star.

Poorna's gang, involving people handling low-profile businesses, backs him to the hilt. Even if it appears a tad unrealistic, the film grows on you thanks to the heart-in-the-right place kind of conversations between Poorna and his friends. Poornachandra is convincing as an aspirational than a happy-go-lucky youngster.

The film's biggest strength is the character graph of Naveen Raj. It's a superb decision from the filmmaker to begin the story with him, who is essentially the film's antagonist. You know how circumstances force him to be morally ambiguous yet we somewhere empathise with him.

Dileep Raj portrays the character brilliantly. He is so natural as a man trying to become big but also holding on to whatever he has. This also involves being a snake that stings another gifted singer like him.

Sunil Mysuru goes beyond scratching the surface of his subject. The film reflects our deep-seated preference for Bombay (Mumbai) artistes for stage shows. But it also smartly acknowledges the city's ability to allow commoners to dream big. We feel for these orchestra artistes who sing and reproduce works of the greats but never get close to what their idols have achieved. It throws the onus on us to be aware of the plight of orchestra shows, which is perhaps on the decline, at least in big cities.

'Orchestra Mysuru' falters again when it focuses too much on a silly spat with Poorna and his best friend in the second half. Poorna is ready for the hard slog to take on Naveen and had the director been more focused, he would have trimmed the film to fully flesh out the portion where he forms a team from the scratch.

Why don't our filmmakers believe in the go-for-broke staging of big scenes in the final act? Be it the song that goes viral or Poorna's moment of glory, the director is hesitant in staging the scenes to their fullest potential. Ideally, these are the 'masala' moments of a rollercoaster journey we love to cherish. I have the same grouse with the love story, which doesn't go beyond the meet-cute scenes. Isn't it part of the film's world-building?

Raghu Dixit's songs might strike a chord as standalone numbers but unfortunately, they sound tone-deaf in the film. Apart from the soothing 'Nadiyondu', the other tracks don't have the inspirational and realistic flavour required for the story. The final song should have teared us up, given the protagonist's inspiring climb to the top.

'Orchestra Mysuru' is billed as 'Sankrantige ge ondu Kannada cinema' (A Kannada film on Sankranti). To the team's credit, the film is definitely watchable, compared to the other forgettable big festival releases. But the bigger victory for the makers will be when people show curiosity toward worthy films like these without stars.