Pitta Kathalu

Pitta Kathalu (transl. Short stories) is a 2021 Indian Telugu-language anthology drama film consisting of four short film segments, directed by Nag Ashwin, B. V. Nandini Reddy, Tharun Bhascker and Sankalp Reddy.^[1][2] The film features an ensemble cast of Amala Paul, Ashwin Kakumanu, Eesha Rebba, Jagapati Babu, Satyadev, Lakshmi Manchu, Ashima Narwal, Saanve Megghana, Sanjith Hegde and Shruti Haasan, amongst others.^[1] The film was produced by RSVP Movies and Flying Unicorn Entertainment.^[3][4] The film premiered on Netflix on 19 February 2021.^[5][6] It is Netflix's first Telugu original film.^[1]

Pitta Kathalu
Official release poster
Directed by	Nag Ashwin B.V. Nandini Reddy Tharun Bhascker Sankalp Reddy
Written by	Tharun Bhascker Radhika Anand Nag Ashwin Nanda Kishore Emani
Produced by	Ronnie Screwvala Ashi Dua
Starring	Shruti Haasan Satyadev Eesha Rebba Amala Paul Lakshmi Manchu Jagapathi Babu Ashima Narwal
Cinematography	Naveen Yadav Niketh Bommireddy Richard Prasad
Edited by	Abhinav Reddy Danda Kiran Ganti Junaid Siddiqui Upendra Varma
Music by	Songs: Vivek Sagar Mickey J. Meyer Sanjith Hegde–Soorya Praveen Prashanth R Vihari Score: Smaran
Production companies	RSVP Movies Flying Unicorn Entertainment
Distributed by	Netflix
Release date	19 February 2021 (2021-02-19)
Running time	150 minutes
Country	India
Language	Telugu

Segments

Segment	Director	Writer	Music
Ramula	Tharun Bhascker	Tharun Bhascker	Vivek Sagar
Meera	B. V. Nandini Reddy	Radhika Anand	Mickey J. Meyer
xLife	Nag Ashwin	Nag Ashwin	Sanjith Hegde, Soorya Praveen
Pinky	Sankalp Reddy	Nanda Kishore Emani	Prashanth R.Vihari

Plot

Ramula

"Ramula" is the narrative of a modest community Telangana young lady named Ramula (Saanve Megghana) and her fit-in vain boyfriend, Ram Chander (Abhay Bethiganti). Once, a politician named Swaroopa Akka (Manchu Lakshmi) witnesses Ramula trying to commit suicide by falling from a bridge and she asks her what happened, to which Ramola says that her husband broke up with her. Swaroopa gives her a plan: seduce Ram and get their sex tapes with him because he might be manipulating her that she decides to ruin him if he is just using her. After having sex, Ram goes to his parents and expresses his love for Ramula and says that he will marry her. After telling this to Ramula, she gets happy, and Ram decides to propose to her in front of her family. Ramula calls Swaroopa and tells her everything, but Swaroopa decides to ruin them both for her career by exposing their sex tapes in a live news program which her family and everyone sees. A traumatized Ramula jumps from her terrace and dies in front of Ram, who brought musical band members to propose to her. The story ends with Ram shouting Ramula's name in tears.

Meera

This story is about a youthful spouse named Meera (Amala Paul), who goes through a difficult stretch because of her dubious and insane husband Vishwa Mohan (Jagapathi Babu). Meera is pregnant and has two children. She cheats on her husband with a guy named Shiva (Ashwin Kakumanu), which Vishwa knows. On the couple's 10th anniversary celebration, Vishwa's friend Abbas (Vamsee Chaganti) gives them a beautiful portrait of girl turning behind. Everybody says that it looks like Meera, and this makes Vishwa furious. He slaps Abbas, making everyone leave. The next day, he takes Meera to the hospital for checking if the father of the unborn foetus is Shiva's or Vishwa's, but one of Vishwa's friends and his wife finds the truth. It is revealed that Meera was raped multiple times by Vishwa. After a while, Vishwa imagines Abbas and Meera having sex, which makes him go to Abbas's house. Vishwa thrashes Abbas and finds that he was having sex with a guy, revealing that Abbas is gay. Vishwa is then arrested for seven years. After a few days, it is revealed that Shiva was an imaginary person and Meera just created a character in order to provoke Vishwa and wait for the time to be free. At the end, Meera smiles that she got her freedom.

xLife

xLife is the story of Vik (Sanjith Hegde), a youngster who assumes control over the world with his advanced innovation called X-Life, which has billions of clients. One day, his company celebrates four billion users of X-Life, but it gets hacked by Vik's college friend Neel (Sangeeth Shoban). When Neel warns Vik to stop X-Life, Vik uses a paralytic device on Neel's forehead that paralyses him and drowns him into his fears. After freezing Neel, Vik sees Divya (Shruti Haasan), a kitchen staff who was caught stealing food. He leaves her with a warning but sends her great food. A few days later, Vik uses Divya as a model for increasing his friends' biscuits company. He fires Divya and hires her again as a personal assistant. He invites her for dinner through virtual reality, but she denies and says that she knows a better place to have food. It is a terrace that she mentioned, and the dinner was a piece of loaf. She said that she wanted the world to not be hungry and wanted to know the value of food. The next day, Vikram finds her missing. When he takes a look in his CCTV footage, he finds that his assistant Kranthi (Dayanand Reddy) was trying to harass her. Seeing this, Vikram finds Divya trying to jump off the building, but he saves her and calms her down. As Vik proposes to Divya, she calms herself, and they kiss. After a few moments, Vik takes her to the X-Life heart room . When Vik was showing Divya the heart, she used the paralytic device on him . It is revealed that Divya and Neel together planned to shut down X-Life, wanting everyone to enjoy the world and not be stuck and addicted to a virtual world that is controlled. She had also planned the fight with Kranti. She then removes the batteries of the heart and says that she knew Vik's fear was his father because Vik witnessed his mother's domestic abuse, so she made him remind himself of those days. After a few seconds. X-Life shuts down. Everybody removes their console and sees the beautiful world around them.

Pinky

Pinky is about an upcoming writer Vivek (Satyadev), who is in a committed relationship but has an unsanctioned romance with his ex-wife Pinky (Eesha Rebba)

Cast

Ramula	Meera	xLife	Pinky
Abhay Bethiganti as Ram Chander Saanve Megghana as Ramula Lakshmi Manchu as Swaroopakka Anjaiah Milkuri as Kishan, Ramula's brother Venkat Kanaka as Bal Reddy, a party worker Sai Mahesh as Kiran, a party worker Shivani Mahi as Swathi Muralidhar Goud	Jagapathi Babu as Vishwa Mohan Amala Paul as Meera Ashwin Kakumanu as Shiva Pragathi as CI Vamsee Chaganti as Abbas Kireeti Damaraju as Vivek Kunak Kaushik as Sandeep Sunaina as Shobha	Shruti Haasan as Divya Sanjith Hegde as Vik Sangeeth Sobhan as Neel Uko as General Koko Anish Kuruvilla as Broski Thanmayi as Heera Dayanand Reddy as Kranthi	Eesha Rebba as Priyanka "Pinky" Satyadev as Vivek Srinivas Avasarala as Harsha Ashima Narwal as Indu

Reception

Hemanth Kumar of Firstpost wrote that "On the whole, Pitta Kathalu is a mixed bag and not all short stories find their rhythm and clarity of thought to say what they want to. But it's also a step in the right direction in many ways. Pitta Kathalu exists in a Telugu cinematic universe and in this world, women are largely in control of their own lives and more than anything, they hate to be mansplained. Thank God, they aren’t treated like deities with pure thoughts and leading pious lives. Their shades of grey is what adds colour to Pitta Kathalu." and gave 3 out of 5 stars.^[7] Neeshita Nyayapati of The Times of India wrote about the film that "While one has to search hard to find imperfection in Tharun’s rural tale, Nandini, Nag Ashwin and Sankalp’s urban stories in Pitta Kathalu are not without flaws. Predictability haunts all the stories to a certain extent, but what matters is how the directors manage to pull it off. It is definitely refreshing to see Telugu cinema tell tales of real, damaged relationships (and women) on screen without judgement. Give this one a try this weekend!"^[8] Baradwaj Rangan of Film Companion South wrote "Two films work. Two don’t. And the standout is Tharun Bhascker Dhaassyam’s 'Ramula’, which takes big risks with form."^[9]