Review: Shadow - avoidable fare
Sample this...on the run from cops, our hero before doing stunts that one usually associates with a race driver, escapes only to sustain a head injury.
He loses his memory and starts behaving like a child. The doctor advises the caretakers to help him revisit his childhood memories or interact with people that he has a strong emotional connect with.
After creating hara-kiri owing to his sudden imbalance, he gets to see his mother, who he assumed to be dead, on Skype. And what happens? Yes, you guessed it right! He gets back to normalcy. It happens only in Tollywood.
Bravo! With a damp squib like `Shakti' behind him, one expected director Meher Ramesh to be cautious but the fact remains is that he bid adieu to his strength action and was out to do a Sreenu Vaitla.
Emotions and comedy gets utmost prominence and are met with precision in Vaitla movies, but Ramesh fails to balance them in `Shadow'. The resultant product is wishy-washy, uninteresting.
During Bombay riots, Raghupati (Naga Babu) hands over a file to Surya, a journalist. The file named `Operation Shadow' has comprehensive details of mafia don Nanabhai's (Aditya Pancholi) illegal empire and activities.
Nanabhai comes to know that Raghupati has backstabbed him. He is killed in front of his son Raja by him. Possessing evidence Raja manages to escape from Nanabhai's henchmen, but in the process loses his mom and sister.
He is then raised by an old mechanic (played by Naseer). Raja's life ambition is to avenge his father's death. Cut to modern times, Raja, now Shadow (Venkatesh), along with his group of friends, lands in Malaysia after coming to know the whereabouts of Nanabhai and his gang.
He kills two of Nana's trusted aides, but a freak accident leads him to discover that his mother is alive. What next?
After a not-so impressive introduction of Venky, Meher gets to his story which is been there and witnessed umpteen times.
Writers Kona Venkat and Gopi Mohan, who have successful films like `Ready', `Dookudu' and `Baadshah' to their credit, follow the same success formula action with entertainment.
Sadly, the story is designed in a manner that you can predict what happens every now and then the biggest setback of the film.
Blame it on the writers for making Venky behave like an immature person or let the actor take the blame for heeding to them the portions where he calls Madhubala (Taapsee) as aunty were embarrassing.
Even die-hard Venky fans will not come to terms with it considering the standards that Venky has set for himself. If that's not enough the writers create a situation where Venky does a Gabbar the antakshari.
While it makes you laugh for few seconds it was certainly unwarranted even if Pawan and Venky are known to be best of friends. The writers, however, compensate for their lackluster show in the second half. Their expertise is shown in sequences where Jayaprakash Reddy and MS Narayana play their part in helping Shadow to kill one of his enemies.
On the emotional front, Meher falls flat. The sequence where Shadow's friends reveal to his mom that he is her son is poorly handled and therefore it fails to pack a punch that is usually associated with a Venky film. Besides going over the top time and again, action sequences are poorly conceived.
Performance wise, it's a cakewalk for Venky. Wake him up in the middle of the night and he will do these roles with ease, but it's a role that he would like to forget.
Taapsee is high on fashion and that's it. Srikanth fumbles with his English lines, but is not given a meaty role. Aditya Pancholi remains more of as a male model while MS and JP do what is required of them. Summing up, Venky fans might love some moments of the film, but to others it is a strict `no'.
News Posted: 27 April, 2013
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