Abhay is another Darshan film with the message that “people should fight despotism by taking the law into their own hands.”
Director Mahesh Babu tries to incorporate all the available cinematic elements and ends up struggling to impress the audience. He employs the situations in Kannada, Tamil and Telugu films of the 1960s and 70s where an intelligent hero and heroine fool muddleheaded villains with the help of clownish comedians. Although such situations infuse some life into the film, an excess of it makes the audience laugh at the film-maker.
Mahesh Babu and writer Jagannatha Maharishi spend all their film knowledge and struggles to weave a theme that cannot convince even the hero’s fans. However, they do not pretend to have any reason and logic, cogent continuity and a basic sense of decency in imposing the farce in this name of comedy, which at times borders on vulgarity if not obscene.
Film: Abhay (Kannada)
Director: Mahesh Babu
Cast: Darshan, Om Prakash Rao, Arathi Roy
The storyline: a girl Arathi (Arathi Roy) runs away from a nameless town in the State to Amsterdam to escape the ire of a despot who wants to marry her. There she falls in love with a good Samaritan Abhay (Darshan). And the boy Abhay, whose valour in fighting the kidnappers of a VIP girl influences an international flight to wait for him, fools and fights against villains with the support of clown Shastri (Om Prakash Rao).
