A pedestrian fare

Romance –cum- action flicks, in other words, violent love stories are the most regular type of films which Indian masala movie makers thrive on. It offers everything to everybody, creating the need to balance machismo with soft undertones of feminine grace and love. If handled well, despite its assembly line nature, such movies manage to score to a considerable extent among the audience.

In the case of this week’s release – ‘Lover’ - which begins normally with a murder and a Rayalaseema backdrop ( Anantapur, instead of the Kadapa- Chittoor routine), the hero ( Raj Tarun) for once is shown with a unique persona of his own. He is a re-designer of motorbikes with a tech team to back up, which is good enough to hack into other IT systems when necessary. Of course, he has his hangers on, who are around to live off his money and skills and be drink buddies when necessary.

Into this usual Telugu action milieu comes in the Malayalee twist when our hero gets admitted into a local hospital where our heroine is a Keralite nurse, obviously a popular one at that. Having made the cross-border connect with a little of Tamil brought in, director Annish Krishna parades the baddies, led by Sachin Khedekar, who is not shown speaking at all, making him a silent menacing type. Whipping up a concoction of brotherly sentiment, action, betrayal and making a trip to Kerala and its serene beauty, the film plods along in a pre-determined route with no surprise till the end. Rather belatedly, the technical brilliance of the hero and his team is put to use in the final reel when the baddies crash on the highway and all is well.

With around a dozen releases to his credit, Raj Tarun has been around in the film industry at a certain perch but his recent films have done nothing to prop up his cool image. This film, an eminently avoidable one, is a disappointing fare. The heroine, Riddhi Kumar, carries herself naturally but does not have the zing to set off a competition among the other young things who have made a mark in recent times. Despite Dil Raju’s backing ensuring a better exposure for it, one wonders whether the hero’s fans will be happy with a flat, run-of-the-mill film of their favourite star.

BY K Naresh Kumar