PUSHPA & THE ART OF MAKING MOVIE AS AN OTT SERIES
The Morning Standard|December 10, 2024
TRUE terror," Kurt Vonnegut said, "is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country." Or making movies. Sukumar's Pushpa 2: The Rule could well be the end of cinema as we know it.
C P SURENDRAN
PUSHPA & THE ART OF MAKING MOVIE AS AN OTT SERIES

Normally, a movie has a basic three-act structure: a plot hook within, say, the first 15 minutes that destabilizes the protagonist, the rising odds confronting the hero/heroine for the next 50 minutes or so, and the resolution.

But the Pushpa franchise sees itself more as OTT in theaters than a movie. Just as Pushpa 2: The Rule ends in an episodic cliff-hanger, Pushpa 3 is announced. We get up from the seats happy, deaf, and ready for more of the same.

As with Pushpa 1, the eponymous hero essayed with neurotic intensity by Allu Arjun, Pushpa 2 clearly continues to consume tribal steroids mixed in all his regular mutton-curry meals. Sukumar sees to it that almost every scene has a conflict. It almost always begins with the low caste/black sheep protagonist wanting something, is humiliated, and then getting it.

This formula is how the movie grows-mostly sideways. For example, the state CM Narasimha Reddy, who is in power partly because of Pushpa's charity, refuses to be photographed with the sandalwood smuggler, fearing a political backlash. But Pushpa's wife Srivalli (Rashmika Mandanna) has been promised the gift of the photograph. Naturally, the virtuous, family-oriented Indian audience is more aligned with Pushpa's honor at home than the CM's political fortunes.

This story is from the December 10, 2024 edition of The Morning Standard.

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This story is from the December 10, 2024 edition of The Morning Standard.

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