Venkee Review

Suspense and comedy are not nature born siblings. It is difficult to mix the two. But Sreenu Vaitla, the director of Venkee, seems to have pulled off this coup. And that is thanks in a large measure to heros Ravi Tejas skill and the understated elegance of heroine Sneha.

The film is a loose take-off on an old Malaylam hit (120 Madras Mail starring, among others, Mammooty and Mohanlal). The film begins in a train (from Vizag to Hyderbad) where the heroVenkateshwar Rao (Raviteja) and his three friends (Chitram Sreenu, Srinivasa Reddy, Ramchander) bump into Sravani (Sneha) and her sceptical father.

Like all happy-go-lucky heroes, the loud-talking Venkateshwar Rao too falls instantly in love with Sravani. And as he proposes to her in the train itself, his father does not take to this kindly. He gives a dressing down to Venkateshwar who, in turn in an inebriated state, vows to kill him (Sravanis father).

As providence and the film plot would have it, he is indeed killed during the journey itself and the needle of suspicion points towards Venkateshwar. The film picks up tempo from this as the hero goes out in search of the real culprit.

The film in fact is two-parted; the first is a bit of a romp with Ravi Teja and his friends having a whale of time in the train with their free-spirited gamboling. The second half is serious with Ravi Teja (with suitable serious looks) in hot pursuit of the real killer.

It is a role that is straight into Ravi Tejas alley. He is at ease as the ruckus-throwing, fun-loving youth in the train and then as the tough-as-nails investigator. Sneha, as his opposite, is assured and carries off her role with ease. The rest of the cast is also poised.

The other star of the film is Prasad Murella with his eye-boggling camera work. He is positively brilliant in the train scenes. The music of Devi Prasad is a mixed bag. There are good melodies as well as some frontbenchers numbers.

Sreenu Vaitla never allows the film to sag and infuses the right elements at the right time.

Looks like Ravi Teja has another winner on his hand.