Sapta Sagaradaache Ello [Side A] : Love Echoes
Star Cast: Rakshit Shetty, Rukmini Vasanth, Achyuth Kumar, Avinash, Pavitra Lokesh, Gopal Krishna and Ramesh Indira.
Music Composed by Charan Raj
Edited by Varun Goli
Cinematography by Advaitha Gurumurthy
Produced by Rakshit Shetty
Directed by Hemanth M Rao
At a hill station, we love to experience echoes. We try to know the right spot where the echoes are prominent and we become kids among kids to enjoy gain such an experience. If we observe closely, we also hope for such echoes in our daily life. When we work hard and find success, we want our name to echo among our co-workers with praise. When we are celebrating, we want the joy to echo among everyone around us. When we go through tough times, we want our sorrows to echo in front of our family or friends. Whether they can find a solution or not, if we cannot find a solution or not, we want these sorrow echoes to relieve us enough to find a way to cope with them. More than anything, if our love doesn’t echo back from a close one – be it a partner, be it parents, be it friends, be it someone we care about – we would be heartbroken and shattered. Can love really echo though? When a soul can find its mate, we can say that it has found another soul that can echo its feelings and resonate in life with happiness and satisfaction.
People talk about Radha Krishna as the ultimate lovers because of such echoes. Krishna broke off his flute when Radha died because he understood he could never be the someone he used to be without Radha. Her absence pained him so much that he lost interest in everything else. Even though his worldly, spiritual, and cosmic knowledge was greater than anyone else’s, he could not fill the void that was created by the absence of someone who filled his heart, who brightened his mornings, who sweetened his nights, and who made his life worth all the struggles. Just close your eyes for a moment and think about that someone in your life who makes it all worthwhile. Whoever they are, without them we feel like living as dead souls. Whatever we do, whatever we want to do, however we do, the result just doesn’t have similar depth or color as much as we wish it had. We can take Shiva‘s example too. He never wanted to get married but when Sathi came along and earned his love, he couldn’t resist entering into wedlock. Her absence made him lose all his senses and wander around. Couldn’t he just go back to being that person after her sacrifice? We cannot. However reluctant or however willing one might be when a soul finds its true echo and connects with it, the connection will never die. In the form of memories, the souls will always be in contact forever.
Spoiler Alert:
Sapta Sagaradaache Ello means crossing the seven seas for someone. In Telugu too, we tell a story about a prince who fought the villain who held his princess captive seven oceans or seas away. Metaphorically, it means he traveled from one corner of the earth to another for love. Even a soul makes such a connection with another soul. In the movie, Hemanth M. Rao did not try to overburden us with cinematic scenes. While the writing takes us to Mani Ratnam, GVM kind of characters, the setting is inspired by Gulzar, Basu Chatterjee style of narrative – close to reality. No character tries to play a “hero” for the sake of being a “hero”. No character tries to play “villain” for the sake of it. Every character has its own desires and dreams. A random character that Priya meets while traveling on a bus also shares a relationship with her. There is a story, in their nods and silence. Hemanth Rao doesn’t try to over-polish it. Sometimes, it is better to eat rice that is unpolished for our digestive system to not get too soft as the stomach is the most sensitive organ. One wrong food item and the entire system collapses just like that. It is similar to that of weaving a cloth – one wrong thread – the entire cloth will be spoilt.
The second metaphor has been used by Hemanth M. Rao, masterfully. Manu becomes a weaver after fighting with his destiny. According to Karma Siddhantam, there is always reciprocation and retribution for how we act or the decisions we make. In a way, our act today, we echo in some other way at some other situation later. If not in this birth, in the next birth for sure. Manu struggles to accept the mistake he committed. He did not commit a mistake by writing his destiny with a choice but he did a mistake by writing the destiny of Priya. There is no shortcut to achieving our dreams. The hardtoil is the only way. Be it Dulquer Salmaan, or be it Fahad Faasil, or be it Alia Bhatt, or be it Vijay Deverakonda, or be it Rajinikanth, or be it Chiranjeevi. There is no shortcut to their fame. Yes, three of the examples are “nepo-kids” but they did not attain the stature they enjoy today, because of their parents. But the manipulators around us, try to cloud our judgment and tell us that there is a shortcut to achieve what we dream about. While you run behind such sand dunes, at times, you might find a new path but most of the times you end up wandering deep in the desert. Here, Manu’s decision to run behind sand dunes did not hurt him more than it did Priya.
The crime he committed is to force her into this whirlpool of pain. While she tried to swim through it with his help, he realized that he was hopeless. The people around him tried to use him, the people who really could support him, and asked him to accept the reality. He did and realised that he was inflicting all the pain on her. He wanted to hate himself, he wanted to kill himself, he just wanted to end her pain. All he could do was liberate her. Did she want that liberation? Did that liberation push her into another whirlpool of pain? Can he really go back to that innocent self once again? Side B has those answers. I really loved the usage of cassettes and Side-A and Side-B references. The first time, I wanted to hear my voice and narrate something, I recorded it on a tape recorder and heard it back. That experience is just ultimate. So, there is a nostalgic touch as well to this romantic drama. Hemanth M. Rao from Kavaludaari [2019] and Godhi Banna Sadharana Mykattu [2016] have matured more in writing. His real story is waiting for us in Side-B than this Side-A. While Side-A stands alone as its own story and has its complexity, Side-B is the journey that not many dare to touch and show on-screen. Side-A ended with everyone making decisions but Side-B will have repercussions and desires of those dead souls trying to be alive again.
Rakshit Shetty from Ulidavaru Kandanthe [2014] and Manu from this movie are poles apart. He has grown in his level of understanding of a script and performing as an actor. He just lived like Manu to bring him alive on screen. After some time, we forget that it is Rakshit Shetty and we believe that it is Manu. His simple behavior change for the character proves that he is maturing further as an actor. Rukmini Vasanth could be the quintessential heroine of Balachander, K. Vishwanath, and Bapu at a time. Not because of her looks, but because of the connectivity she has in her presence and she is a good performer, too. I liked all the actors and their performances. Special mention should be given to Charan Raj for his OST. He is one of the greatest finds of Kannada Cinema. It is the writing of Hemanth M. Rao that keeps these characters real in a circumstance that seems uncommon. It is more or less like we are watching Mahabharat from the eye of a soldier who is asked to die for his masters, even though he did not commit any sin directly. Your allegiance to someone and your belief in any idea need careful deliberation and it is said in a more subtle way. When a simple story resonates with you, it becomes another epic. While Sapta Sagaradaache Ello is a great start to a novel, now it has to end well to claim the status of EPIC. I hope it does! : fingers crossed:
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