Producer: D. Suresh Babu
Director: Boyapati Srinu
Cast: Venkatesh, Nayantara, Shriya, Shivaji, Master Athulith, Ramya Krishna (Spl. Appearance), Vijay Kumar, Ali, Thanikella Bharani, Paruchuri Venkateswara Rao, Jaya Prakash Reddy, Ashish Vidyarthi
Music: Devi Sri Prasad

It is widely opined that films served with a generous helping of commercial elements can make a film click fruitfully with the audience. Although this mantra cannot be totally overlooked, at the same time it cannot be always counted on to furnish the desired upshot. Boyapati Seenu’s ‘Thulasi’ is one such film tightly packed as a commercial entertainer that has a tad of everything – love, romance, action, drama, glossy songs and dance to stars like Venkatesh and Nayantara. But it is the child artiste Atulit who comes as a welcome respite from all the hackneyed stuff this film is impregnated with it.

The story runs in the customary trend where a boy meets a girl, courts her and finally marries her and from here initiates a whole lot of problems. The story divulges as the plot moves to and fro in time. Thulasi Ram (Venkatesh) rescues a fashion opera from being ruined by a goon Basavaraj (Rahul Dev) and his aides and smack them back and blue. Whereas the models express their gratitude towards him, fashion designer Vasundhara (Nayantara) gives him a cold shoulder and leaves without sharing anything.

The film then trails into flashback that narrates the past life of the two. Thulasi first met Vasu on an airport where she had gone along with her friends to board the flight. Like all other spicy potpourri, their relationship took off from hatred and finally landed on love. After the opening tiff, both Thulasi and Vasu miss their flights and trains expediently and fall in love by the time they reach their destination after much singing and dancing in the backdrop of Schonbrunn and Hofburg palaces and other sights in Vienna.

Like all other happy love stories this one too take a step forward with marriage. But soon after their wedding, trouble crops up and they separate after the birth of their son Harsha (Atulit) who tries hard to reunite his estranged family. But wait; there is a slight twist to the tale as well.

Thulasi’s character, although a gentle one, for the most part is caught up in fights with different gangs of villains. Nearly half of the film takes us through, punches and kicks but the background score that runs in tandem with the action sequence do offer uniqueness to this otherwise fisticuff tale. The initial half of the film is comfortably soft and romantic unlike the latter half.

Countless songs make their way here and there throughout the film that somewhat appears bane. The emotional aspect is overflowing in the second half to render this film a high dramatic appeal.

As regard the performances, Venkatesh seems to juggle comfortably between his romantic scenes to the action ones. He looks good and pulls off his action stances with great ease and flexibility.

Nayantara is quite good in her performance-oriented role. She elegantly switches from skirts to saris and pulls off her role of a single mother craftily. Child artiste Atulit is too good. Cast in a significant role, this little powerhouse of talent shows deftly his prowess as an endowed actor. The villains are as bad as the script warrants them to be and every single one of them has come up with a great performance. Comic relief by Ali appears rather uncalled for.

This action-oriented flick mainly gyrates around the actor and the director has done a good job in handling it. But in doing so, he fumbles with originality and ends up dishing out another stale film. Charged up with action sequences, this film succeeds to impress largely the masses only.

‘Thulasi’ although blessed with all commercial strengths sums up as a clichéd fare.