Nakshatram: A poorly-made cop story

Being on the right side of the law and order enforcers is more of a compulsion for Telugu cinema personalities these days, as the drug drama concerning its stars has sent shivers down the industry. With an odd sense of timing, as the villains of the film are shown indulging in drug and bomb-related crimes, this Krishna Vamsi flick also centres itself on the same issue.

Returning to direction after the 2014 flick ‘Govindudu Andarivadele’, which itself was not an earth shaker, Krishna Vamsi packs in a multi-starrer masala, with a crime and action backdrop. His approach is clearly to show the human side of cops and how they are actually the stars in this unsafe world.

For this plot line to register, he has a desperate Sundeep Kishan badly wanting to become a cop and serve the public like how the legendary Bhakta Hanuman did for Lord Rama.

His mother (Tulasi) eggs him on reminding him of the police family that they have been over three generations. Success, however eludes our hero as he is deficient in English and as he is about to make it for the final round of tests, disaster strikes.

Told more from Sundeep’s point of view, who does a decent job, the film just chugs on mindlessly in the first half with a generous skin show by Regina Cassandra, playing a junior artiste in the film industry.

The director confines her there with her role’s sole objective of getting hitched to the wannabe cop boyfriend. Curiosity about how the twin roles of Pragya Jayaswal, a no-nonsense policewoman and her pairing with Sai Dharam Tej, a tough, commando kind of an officer is unravelled in the second half.

With this kind of a narration, the interest levels could have sustained itself fairly well for sure. If only the bad guys had been tougher and really mean and Vamsi had not fallen back on the standard theme of an ineffective police commissioner (Prakash Raj)not knowing about his son (Tanish)’s bad habits, the root cause of the problems in the first place.

Such a weather-beaten approach to the action part makes it a regular fare where the audience knows how it will all pan out in the end. What is ironical is that the same commissioner is hailed by the Home Minister (J D Chakravarthy, in a cameo, speaking in Telangana dialect) as worthy of his salute and given a post-retirement assignment to train future cops!

This apart, the film suffers from uneven pace and a sense of déjà vu throughout its 165-minute run. So much so, even the presence of so many young stars cannot save this run-of-the mill stuff.

Film Name : Nakshatram

Cast : Sundeep Kishan, Regina, Sai Dharam Tej, Pragya, Prakash Raj, and JD Chakravarthy
Direction : Krishna Vamsi
Genre : Action/ Drama
Likes : Pragya Jayaswal
Dislikes : Oft-repeated action drama