There’s a scene in Disco Raja where Ravi Teja, an infuriated gangster, shouts at the villain as to why he is being provoked and troubled. “I am done with the freaking crap,” he hollers. You almost respond saying, “So am I.” Directed by Vi Anand, Disco Raja is a pointless potpourri of excessive melodrama in the guise of a sci-fi thriller. It’s neither thrilling nor engaging and has many logical loopholes that can’t be overlooked after a point.
The film takes off in Ladakh where we see a group of men on snowmobiles drag an unidentified man, who has been badly beaten up and leaves him in a snowdrift to die under the avalanche. The build-up to this scene hints that it could be none other than our protagonist. While you think he will leap, stand and fight back with those men, nothing happens here. The dead man is retrieved in a frozen state by a group of mountaineers and he is sent to a biological laboratory, where a group of doctors employ all possible means to pull off a medical miracle – bring him back to life. Cut to Delhi, we see a family waiting for the return of their caretaker Vasu (Ravi Teja).
Meanwhile, the doctors resurrect the dead man, who loses his memory in the process. The chief doctor (Shishir Sharma) treats him like a laboratory rat and tells his subordinates – Parineeti (Tanya Hope) and Phalguna (Vennela Kishore) – to not help him get his memories back. While the ‘subject’ struggles to recollect his memories and break away, he is attacked by a group of goons, who, as it turns out, works for a gangster Burma Sethu (Bobby Simha). This situation throws up a revelation the ‘subject’ had no idea about. What follows are a series of ‘twists’ we’ve come to expect from director Vi Anand.
Disco Raja is a classic example of a promising premise that doesn’t fully translate into a compelling film. Despite some stray moments of wit, the absence of any real dramatic conflict in the first hour bores you. You would sincerely wish for the interval card to arrive fast to know the real twist in the tale. The director tried to set the stage for a promising thriller but failed – especially in the second hour – to deliver any edge-of-the-seat moments. Post intermission, the film falls into a predictable mess and you foresee the twists from a mile away. The retro sequence involving Payal Rajput comes off as half-baked as her character lacks depth and fails to evoke any emotion.
Still, the film isn’t bad as there are some portions that are watchable. The characters of Ravi Teja and Burma Sethu play off nicely against each other and their scenes – particularly the Chicken Biryani sequence work well. The climax scene, filmed in the cold chamber seems hurried and looks like a cliche. There are some tedious and routine sequences of inter-gang rivalry too.
Ravi Teja delivers a fairly robust performance in a character that fights with a dilemma, loss, and revenge with sincerity. He is ably supported by Vennela Kishore as a doctor, who is impatiently waiting to know what happened in his patient’s life.
After portraying a lovable character in her last outing iSmart Shankar, one of the female leads of the film, Nabha Natesh has been relegated to the sidelines to that of a supporting character. Payal Rajput too didn’t get the character arc due to her expressionless demeanor. Sunil was seen in a solid role that’s never entirely convincing and he fails to exhibit a fairly authentic portrayal in the second hour.
Bobby Simha gets a menacing character in Burma Sethu and he breathes life into it. The film benefits from Karthik Gattamneni’s avant-garde camera work and SS Thaman’s booming background score which tries to create the drama that the script fails to. With a run-time of nearly 150-minutes, Disco Raja is a film that hardly entertains. As you leave the theatre in the end, you can’t help missing the real sense of fun and thrills that Vi Anand’s films delivered in the past.