Film: Krishnashtami
Cast: Sunil, Nikki Galrani
Director: Vasu Verma
Rating:
There are films which start slowly but soon find their way and manage to grip the audience. Then there are films that start brilliantly, only to lose the plot midway and turn into a dull affair. Unfortunately, Vasu Varma's Krishnashtami belongs to that category of films that disappoints -- from the start to the finish.
With a senseless plot and a mediocre screenplay, this Telugu 'entertainer' has zero entertainment on offer. Instead, it tires the audience with more than two hours of loud dialogues, grating music and lame humour.
A video game designer Krishna (Sunil) is an NRI settled in the United States. Krishna's biggest dream is to return to India and spend time with his family, but his family members prevent him from returning, since there is danger to his life here. An adamant Krishna decides to come anyway without telling anyone. On the way to India, he meets Pallavi (Nikki Galrani) and instantly falls in love with her. After a bit of wooing (two songs), she too falls for him. Meanwhile, upon his return to India, a gang of goons with knives are waiting to kill him the moment he touches down. Krishna somehow manages to escape them and ends up going to the house of a powerful man (Ashutosh Rana). Strangely enough, Rana and his family mistakes Krishna as their son-in-law and fix up his marriage with their younger daughter Priya (Dimple Chopade).
How Krishna manages to clear the misconceptions, wriggle out of the mess and find out why people want to kill him, makes for the rest of the film.
Krishnashtami's problem is that the film fails miserably in all departments. Even though the director tries to add in new twists at regular intervals, they seem so farcical that it's almost laughable. The regular song-and-fight sequences are also mediocre and poorly executed. The biggest let-down is the humour. Despite the presence of fine comedians like Brahmanandam, Posani Murali Krishna and Prudhviraj, the humour looks fake and concocted, and fails to produce any laughs. In fact, the makers resort to despicable methods of racism and sexism in a pathetic attempt to induce humour. For example, Posani calls an African-American lady as 'Black'Berry and tries to shield her from Sunil's side-kick, who creepily ogles at her assets at every given chance.
Sunil makes a grand entry as Tollywood's Golden Star (yes, that's what he's called now), but his performance is far from golden. Loud and boorish, the actor struggles to stay afloat a sinking ship. Nikki Galrani and Dimple Chopade are reduced to songs and a few odd-scenes, in badly written roles. It's a shame to see fine actors like Ashutosh Rana and Mukesh Rishi being wasted in such a poorly scripted film.
For a film that was touted to be a nice, family entertainer that will give the audience bang for their buck, Krishnashtami is a sorry return for your hard-earned buck. Truly Terrible.