'Shakuni' Review: Weak Game

Film: Shakuni
Rating: 2.5/5
Banners: Dream Warrior Pictures, Studio Green
Cast: Karthi, Pranitha, Prakash Raj, Santhanam, Radhika, Kota, Roja, Anushka (spl appearance) and others
Music: G V Prakash Kumar
Cinematographer: PG  Muthiah
Editor: Sreekar Prasad
Story, screenplay, direction: Shankar Dayal
Producers: Gnanavel Raja, Bellamkonda Suresh
 

Tamil hero Karthi who has a decent following in Telugu has now arrived with this new movie and it is slated to be a political thriller. Whether it has the thrills or not let us see

Story
Kamal Krishna (Karthi) is a guy who hails from the small town of Samarlakota and he comes to Hyderabad on a purpose. He wants to meet the Railway minister and other politicians in order to save his ancestral home from being demolished by the government. However, he has a taste of the crooked politicians including the chief minister Bhupathi (Prakash Raj). Getting affected by all these experiences, Kamal decides that the only way to get things done is by gaining power. He is accompanied by an auto driver Appalraju (Santhanam). Whether he gains that power and how he does that forms the rest of the story.

Performances
Karthi is a natural performer and yet again he carries himself without any hiccups. However, there are times when he went casual with his act instead of being serious, that could have been avoided.

Pranitha did justice to the songs and offering visual feast wherever possible. Given her delicious sex appeal and fresh oomph factor, she deserves to be seen more often onscreen.

Prakash Raj has done such roles several times before so it was more like a cakewalk for him and nothing special or extraordinary came from him.

Santhanam tried to bring few smiles with his one-liners, Radhika was alright, Kota did his bit as required, Roja was regular, Nasser was natural, Kiran Rathod has shaped up quite sexily and looks good, Anushka’s special role was a delight. The others were there to fill the screen and do their bit.

Highlights

• Karthi’s performance
• Pranitha’s sex appeal
• Storyline

Drawbacks

• Weak screenplay
• No depth
• Songs and music
• Comedy and romance

Analysis
First things first, a film which has to do with politics has to hold an element of seriousness and a magnitude that involves the audience. Secondly, the conviction in execution of the plot has to be so strong that it can create an edgy feeling for the viewer.

However, all that was missing in this one. Of course, the intention of the director is appreciable since he wanted to convey the anguish of a common man and how he emerges from all the odds. But such topics have been dealt before and that too in a much matured and intense way. The likes of ‘Oke Okkadu’ ‘A Wednesday’ ‘Yuva’ ‘Iddaru’ are classic examples for that. But here, the film goes on a lighter note and though the protagonist is doing something really big that is causing major changes, the audience doesn’t feel the impact.

An ordinary person dealing with a minister in power is not a joke. And winning elections doesn’t happen by distributing cricket bats or bringing ration from the shops. If that was the case then big megastars would have become chief ministers, they would not have merged their parties with others. On the other hand, the romance track was completely weak. The juice of romance was missing and this became even worse with the wrong placement of below average songs. The other conceptual blunder was politics of today is all about money power and muscle power.

While money power was shown, muscle power was zero. There is not a single fight between the hero and villain or the villain’s men. If it was meant to be a film with a message, then this element of realism was needed.

Overall, this is a film which starts off with a good intent, has a powerful idea but the process of execution and the lack of seriousness in the situations has hampered its chances. Editing during the first half was good as the sequences between Santhanam and Karthi were different and interesting. But at few places one could get a feeling that they got dragged. Moreover, it is a dubbed flick so not many will know the likes of Santhanam in Tollywood. At the box office, this could turn out to be a below average fare.

Bottomline: This Shakuni’s dice is very weak…