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Friday, April 26, 2024
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KANNADA PRINCE
EDITOR'S PICK
Rating: * 1/2
It seems director Om Prakash Rao has now become a specialist in lifting
sequences and story lines from non-Kannada films and claiming them as his own.
His recent film "Prince" is borrowed from Ravi Teja and Jyothika
starrer Telugu film "Shock" directed by Harish Shankar.
But as usual Rao claims the screenplay as his own. But the director, who has
made some memorable films like "AK 47" and "Lock up Death",
is honest in admitting that he makes a new pattern of films which can be called
re-mix movies as he re-mixes sequences from popular non-Kannada films.
The real shocker in "Prince" is that it is based on "Shock",
biggest flop in Ravi Teja`s career. This clearly reveals a dearth of ideas.
The cosmetic changes made by Rao in "Prince" is the addition of the
second heroine`s character and few silly comedy sequences which fail to cut ice
with the audience.
"Prince" is perhaps the worst technically designed film in recent
days. Darshan`s films have always been high on its technical content, but this
latest film will shock the audience with many out of focus shots and re-mixed
chasing sequences which have been lifted straight from many well made Telugu
films.
Even the production level is below par compared to the existing standards seen
in Kannada films. It looks like producer Sandesh Nagaraj was only interested in
doing good business by producing a below average product with a charismatic star
like Darshan.
Composer Hari Krishna has been inconsistent these days. He reached a high with
his music in Puneet Raj Kumar`s "Jackie", but disappointed in films
like "Kichcha Huchcha" and many recent releases.
The song "Karnataka bumper lottery" is good, but the other songs are
just average. The songs are poorly picturised. M.S. Ramesh`s dialogues lack
sharpness, they are repetitive.
Vishnu works in an advertisement firm. He is ambitious and has a good sense of
humour. He loves his colleague Anjali and eventually the two get married. His
trouble begins when a team of policeman mistake him for a dreaded terrorist and
even fire at him. He survives the gunshots, but the policemen try to falsely
implicate him by creating false evidence to prove that he is a terrorist.
Vishnu and Anjali move court, but their advocate joins hands with the police and
wrongly advises Vishnu to confess in court about a crime he had not committed.
He is awarded a five-year jail term but he gets parole after a revision
petition.
Vishnu`s tragedy compounds when Anjali gets killed in an accident planned by
policemen. A journalist helps him to come out of jail and after that the story
takes several turns.
The story lacks freshness and the narration does not inspire even the ardent
fans of Darshan, who has tried his level best to salvage the film. As usual, his
action sequences are good, but certainly a film cannot survive just on
well-choreographed fights.
Nikitha and Jennifer look glamourous on screen and the former shines in a couple
of sequences in the second half of the film.
Nothing special can be written about the performances of Shobharaj, Avinash,
Rangayana Raghu and Aadi Lokesh. The cameraman is the real villain in the film,
thanks to his out of focus shots.
