Santosh Sobhan created a niche for himself doing different genre entertainers and he is now coming up with Couple Friendly. The film directed by Ashwin Chandrasekhar is releasing on 14 Feb 2026 as Valentine’s Day special. Let us find out how Couple Friendly entertained movie lovers.
Couple Friendly story revolves around young couple who aspires to realise their dreams staying away from their parents and how they deal with the happenings in their lives.
Shiva ( Santosh Sobhan), comes out of his house in Nellore to Chennai unable to bear the curses of his father ( Goparaju Ramana) to pursue his dream of becoming an interior designer.
Even as he struggles to meet both ends, he happens to meet an aspiring software engineer. Mithra ( Manasa Varanasi), who comes from Chittoor
Where this leads to and what role Mithra's father ( Rajeev Kanakala) and others played form the rest of the narration.
Santosh Sobhan performed well in a natural and realistic manner. The role is tailor-made for him and he shone in it with effortless ease. He played similar roles earlier and so it offered nothing new for him. He however went overboard in the romantic and intimate scenes. He showed the pain and grief of an unemployed youth and also showed variations in the role of a younger on love and as a person who goes all out for his lover to see her happy all the time and give her the best and memorable moments.
Manasa Varanasi impresses with her performance as a young girl who has her own dreams much against with wishes of her parents and how she goes out to realise them. She showed youthful exuberance and also came up with good emotions and expressions.
Both of them delivered dialogues and emoted well according to the situation showing variations and elevating the scenes.
Goparaju Ramana performed well in the role of the hero's father. Rajeev Kanakala made his presence as heroine's father. He showed variations accordingly to the situation and with his body language and screen presence elevated the scenes. His performance just with emotional expressions in his eyes and hug in the pre climax touches hearts.
Yogi Babu is good in the role of hero's friend. Others performed according to their roles.
Couple Friendly story is penned by Ashwin Chandrasekar. He came up with a romantic entertainer to captivate all on the Valentine’s Day. The entire first half progresses with the introduction of the lead pair and their family problems and how they fall in love and the startling happenings in their romantic journey.
Everything looks convenient and the narration and screenplay passes smoothly in a uni dimensional manner with few romantic and hilarious elements before things get serious thus bringing an end to the first half.
The second half takes a serious note and emotions are highlighted to the core, However this dragged the pace of the narration. The pre climax and climax though different in the current context however is stretched to a point.
Though one gets a feeling that everything is predictable in this so called love story, few emotional scenes pierce the hearts.
Aditya Ravindran's background music added soul to the narration and it took viewers into the story. Songs are melodious and situational. The cinematography of Dinesh Purushottaman showed Chennai city in a beautiful manner. The Gorilla shoot in Chennai locations gave a new feel and beautified the scenes on the screen.
Ganesh Siva's editing is ok but could have been better in the second half. Few dialogues are good and thought provoking. Production values are good.
Altogether Couple Friendly is an emotional romantic story. Director Ashwin Chandrasekhar got decent story and got the optimum performances from the cast and crew. With few powerful emotions, he managed to keep viewers glued to the screen.
Genex youngsters will get connected to the story. The first half looks predictable and routine, the second half takes a serious note and emotions are highlighted to the core. A little fine-tuning of the story and script would have added value to the final output.
Ashwin Chandrasekhar took an old point and tried to add novel touch but emerged only partially successful. Considering all these aspects, Cinejosh goes with a 2.75 rating for Couple Friendly.