Khaleja Review

It was really a long wait for the fans of Maheshbabu in particular and the regular audiences in general. After three years, Maheshbabu appeared on the screen and there were lots of expectations as the film is coming from an efficient director like Trivikram Srinivas who gave a big hit like `Athadu' to Maheshbabu. However, this time, Trivikram failed to weave the same magic, though he succeeded to portray Maheshbabu in a novel angle by giving him a tinge of comedy and different style to the hero.

Story

Raju (Maheshbabu) is a taxi driver. He had a chance meeting with Subhashini @ Subbu (Anushka). Whenever Subbu meets Raju, he suffers loss. Once Raju takes two persons in his taxi and one among them is a geologist. He and his assistant get killed and Raju's taxi owner (Dharmavarapu) tells him to deliver a cheque Rs 5 lakh in Rajasthan and get back Rs 1 lakh from them. So Raju leaves for Rajasthan. In Rajasthan, there is a village and the villagers wait for a saviour as the water gets contaminated and people die one after the other there. They believe Raju as their saviour and some coincidences prove that he had divine powers. But Raju escapes from the village and returns to Hyderabad. But one Siddhu (Shafi) follows him. Soon, Raju wants to find out why the villagers treated him as a God. He starts investigation for the reason for the water contamination and finds out that a plastic factory belongs to GK (Prakash Raj) and its discharge of chemicals as the reason behind the deaths? How Raju thwarted the attempts of GK? What is the exact reason for killing innocent villagers? Why GK did not want to take steps to prevent the pollution and intentionally releasing them into the village? How Raju taught a lesson to GK and saved the village. Answers to all these questions form part of the climax.

Dialogues

The dialogues penned by Trivikram himself are terrific. They are just in colloquial language and none of the dialogues appear to have penned specially for a film but appear as if someone is talking casually. Maheshbabu's character got a tinge of comedy due to the different kind of dialogues to appease mass audiences.

Screenplay and direction

Trivikram Srinivas tried to experiment with different kind of screenplay as the story chosen was very delicate. The first half of the film is nice to watch as it evoked good humour with the typical love track between the hero and heroine with incidents that embarrass the hero. The interval bang is worth watching. The first half an hour of the second half is little boring as the director lost grip on the screenplay and story and the audiences started losing patience. At this time, Trivikram begins the action drama and the director was able to bring out the film to capture the attention of mass audiences and the fans of Maheshbabu.

Songs and choreography

The audio was proved a hit even before the release of the film. The music overshadowed the lyrics in some of the songs, while some are melodies which are good to listen. The choreography of songs are good in parts. However, the song `Om Namo Siva Rudraya' picturisation is extraordinary and Shafi should be commended for giving an excellent

performance in that song. Anushka appeared gorgeous in all the songs. However, the selection of costumes in some of the songs for the hero appeared to be not so worthy.

Camera work

The camera work in the film is excellent. Especially the scenic beauty of Rajasthan desert and the background of some of the songs were perfectly captured. Even the action scenes were perfectly shot by Yash Bhat who made his debut into Telugu films.

Action

Action scenes in the film are quite stylish and the punches by Maheshbabu get immediate response from the audiences. Maheshbabu continued give a stylish performance in action scenes right from `Athadu'.

Performance

Maheshbabu is the solo performer in the film. He excelled in dialogue delivery besides maintaining good comedy timing. His dances are okay with Anushka. The heroine did not much scope for performance but to shake legs with the hero. Shafi is another notable performer in the film. Other artistes like Rao Ramesh, Prakash Raj, Subbaraju, Tanikella Bharani just came and went and did justice to their respective roles. Ali, Sunil and Brahmanandam tried to tickle the funny bones of audiences

Verdict

You can watch the film for the sake of Maheshbabu. Trivikram Srinivas, though penned witty dialogues and portrayed him in a different way, the magic is missing somehow. Moreover, the film appeared to be a combination of bits and pieces from different films and the storyline is not very impressive. Though the hero killed the villain, it is not known how he could save the lives of the villagers. One had to wait and watch how the audiences would receive the film and how it fares at Box Office.

Released on: October 7, 2010