Sridevi Soda Center Review - Story

Lighting Suribabbu(Sudheer) is a happy-go-lucky lad. He aims to open up a lighting equipment shop in his area. One fine day, he sees Sridevi (Aanandhi) and falls for her instantaneously. His attempts to woo her yield rich positive results and she too falls in love with him. However, the love story takes steep twists and turns after Sridevi’s father, a casteist man disapproves of their love, saying Suribabu doesn’t belong to their caste. What follows later forms the remaining story.

Sridevi Soda Center Review - Analysis

The lead pair falling in love with each other. Then the father of the protagonist’s love interest deploring their love, saying the latter doesn’t hail from their cast is a beaten to death plot. Karuna Kumar, whose debut film Palasa happened to be a love drama with a caste oppression backdrop, picks a strikingly similar plot again for Sridevi Soda Center. The only major difference could be that Sridevi Soda Center is mounted on a bigger canvas than Palasa.

Sridevi Soda Center taps into the tropes of the genre and it progresses along on a predictable note. The love track between the lead pair starts off well, but as soon as the caste oppression plot sets in, things turn bland and conventional. What follows is a tale of inter-caste love drama that is nobbled by a casteist parent. The boat race sequence and the central characters' establishment scenes are good. A couple of comedy scenes in the opening half are okayish. Comparatively, the opening half makes for an arguably captivating watch. Sudheer Babu delivers a fine performance in the role of a complex character. He looks natural in this ‘massy’ role. He does particularly well in the emotional sequences in the pre-climax and jail portions. Aanandhi is a natural actress and she fits the bill perfectly. Naresh, Raghubabu, and others get stereotypical roles. Mani Sharma's background score is apt to the film’s narrative. The songs are situational. Shamdutt's cinematography is of elite quality. The rustic locales of the Godavari region are pictured in an aesthetic manner. The film has a dark ending and it remains to be seen how Telugu audiences will react to the same. This ‘twist’ is shocking enough. But the ending portion, despite having a serious narrative, doesn’t create the desired amount of impact.

Sridevi Soda Center Review - Verdict

Sridevi Soda Center is a formulaic tale of inter-caste love. It has a few bright moments in either half but the caste oppression scenes are routine. The ending is ‘shocking’. As a whole, the film is a middling love drama.