Mallanna Review

The wait has been long and far, the expectations were high. A blockbuster was supposedly on the cards looking at the teasers. Yes, we are talking about `Mallanna' and now the time has come to assess how effective it has been.

Story

Mallanna (vikram) is a CBI officer during the day and he becomes Mallanna in the night. The latter role is to solve the problems of the poor who write down their problems in a piece of paper and tie it to the tree in the temple of Mallannaswamy. Mallanna is with the economic crimes cell and in one raid, he catches hold of all the assets of PPP (ashish). Subbalakshmi (Shriya) is PPP's daughter and she decides to take revenge. She pretends to be in love with Mallanna and he realizes that. However, things change when the identity of Mallanna is revealed and PPP strikes a deal with him. In the meantime, Subbalakshmi realizes her folly and falls in love with Mallanna genuinely. Does he accept her love? What is the deal? All this forms the rest of the story.

Performances

Vikram carried out his role with elegance and though it lacked voltage, he fitted the bill perfectly. Shriya was sizzling hot and her oomph was used to the fullest, Ashish Vidyarthi was good, Krishna was okay, Mukesh Tiwari was underutilized, Prabhu was regular, Brahmanandam was not required, Y G Mahendran was okay, the others did their bit to contribute to the movie.

Technical aspects

The dialogues were weak, the script was written without direction and the screenplay was bad. Music was a saving grace but cinematography was quite jarring. Editing was too short and abrupt, costumes were a delight and art department was overwhelming.

Director's portrayal

The director has come up with a good thought he has failed in presenting it to the Telugu audience. The narrative was weak from his end and also the sequence of scenes was disconnected, firstly he should have focused on building up the plot and then taking it to a smooth culmination which was missing completely. His focus was more on the style and presentation but he failed to give depth to the characters or the plot in an effective manner.

Critic's view

The film could have been a blockbuster if it was handled well. The romance was barely there, comedy was silly and there is too much of the `Cock' thing which kind of shows eccentricity than entertainment. Also, it was clear that the movie was missing elements that would appeal to the Telugu audience. While the first half took off on a very plain way, even the second half did not have anything special to offer in terms of stunts, songs or intensity of the scenes. The film would sink quickly. There seems to be a major lapse in the handling of the technical aspects as well, not even one shot lasts for more than 6-7 seconds, it is visually so random and disturbing.

Verdict

Poor..

Released on: 21.08.09