Aryan

An athlete who fails a dope test is stripped of her gold medal. She ends up marrying the head of the sports training centre and at last, wins a gold medal, and her pride.

This sports-centric film is like a breath of fresh air. Kudos to late D Rajendra Babu for choosing a subject which has rarely been used by Sandalwood filmmakers. Aryan has sentiment, excitement, drama, jealousy and romance, all in equal measure.

Although testing positive for drugs is nothing new in the world of sports, few films have dealt with the issue. Babu has selected it as the theme and woven a romantic story around it.

Shwetha (Ramya), a sprinter and gold medalist, is in love with her coach Aryan (Shivarajkumar). Unfortunately, she has to part with the laurel as she tests positive for drugs and is banned for two years. Aryan can’t do anything to help her as there’s evidence of her having consumed drugs before the event. But Shwetha thinks that Aryan didn’t come to her rescue and blames him of getting closer to Hamsa (Archana Gupta), another athlete trained by him. A hurt Shwetha parts ways with him. The story takes a curious turn when Aryan finds that Shwetha is married to Surendra Patil (Raghu Mukherjee), head of the coaching centre in Singapore where Aryan works. The audience is in for another surprise when they get to know that it was Shwetha’s father (Sharath Babu) who had hatched a plan in connivance with Hamsa to make Shwetha lose her medal. There’s more.

Shivarajkumar is outstanding in his portrayal of the coach. Ramya balances the roles of athlete and lover with finesse. Sharath Babu and Raghu Mukherjee have done justice to their acts. Composer Jessir Gift’s music and KS Chandrasekhar’s cinematography are added attractions.