Mr Bachchan Review - Lame Commercial Flick!

Ashwin Ram

Remake of Hindi film ‘Raid’, Mr.Bachchan is a period action drama starring Ravi Teja, Bhagyashri Borse and Japapathi Babu in lead roles. Directed by Harish Shankar of Duvvada Jagannadham fame.

Premise:

Ravi Teja is an Income Tax officer who has been ordered to raid a big shot, an ex-Minister played by Jagapathi Babu. The series of events forms the remaining story.

Writing/ Direction:

The opening scene idea is impressive where a group impersonate to attend a match-making event but they are actually Income Tax officers who are in to raid the place. Post that, everything happens as per convenience. The hero gets suspended for being honest in work, and he goes to his hometown. Wastes one entire hour till interval with silly scenes, there’s only lust in the name of romance, family-oriented portions targeted for the elderly people are filled with vintage songs. Literally felt like sitting in a Sangeeth function, clueless why someone or the other keeps on singing random songs in every single scene. The choice of songs are also mostly Hindi, so no connection. Midpoint promises a better second half, but things become worse. At least the first hour had a few laughable moments, there’s barely anything valuable in the latter. Star Boy Siddhu appears in a cameo, the scene is enjoyable but it's not really necessary for the subject. The cat and mouse game is poorly executed, so illogical that the villain is roaming around, playing games with CM and PM getting out from his house while IT raid is happening. The intended mass moments are predictable, and the self-praise punch dialogues don’t excite.

Performances:

Ravi Teja’s screen presence and stylish persona is fun to watch, but his dialogue delivery is funny especially when he tries to be serious. Bhagyashri Borse is a good find, she fits well as a typical Telugu cinema heroine, being an energetic dancer and the glam girl. Jagapathi Babu’s villainic mannerism is annoying and fails to work out.

Technicalities:

Pretty good masala songs, and the way they are choreographed and pictured on-screen make them entertaining, irrespective of the monotonous placements. Mediocre background music, no big scope for the composer to score high. Decent camera work, provided what is exactly required for the film without spoiling anything further. Old-school editing that flattens the film, many needless romance and heroic scenes which could have been chopped-off, tweaking certain scene orders could have improved them. The opening and the climax fights look so cool, there’s nothing to cheer for the rest.

Bottomline

A good subject extracted from a solid source material, spoiled to a great extent with unwanted sequences in the first half and unimpressive plot situations in the last hour.

Rating - 2/ 5