In Jadoogadu, courtesies unfold at reckless speed. The film commences with protagonist Krishna (Naga Shaurya) expressing his desire to be rich and the next moment, you see a moneylender named Anakonda landing at his doorstep.
After a dose of pelvic thrusts and making good progress, he throws a bash in a bar and finds a girl falling for his words. The dream sequences take off and the lead actor amidst all the activity pushes himself quite hard for what is his most conveniently commercial avatar to date.
The tone of the film is restless and you for obvious reasons, expect a solid plot in store. But with time, all such intentions are put to rest.
Cast: Naga Shaurya, Sonarika Bhadoria, Ashish Vidyarthi, Ajay
Director: Yogesh
Genre: Action-comedy
Music: Sagar Mahati
Bottomline: The magic rests only in the title.
Most of the proceedings take a visibly adult turn as the film progresses. The apparently romantic equation between the lead actors is driven by lust. The screeching dialogue backing doesn’t suggest any different intentions.
There’s double entendre served in addition to the sarcasm embedded in the lines. The frames barely have an oxygen supply. The narrative is pushy and fabricated, whereas the narrative lacks any little intelligence to let the stale plot take a backseat.
While it’s Srinivas Reddy desperate for the comic honours in the initial hour, it’s left to an increasingly caricatured Saptagiri to fill the gaps in the latter one.
Even as you realise the lack of effort in the making, the cheap pleasures that it settles for, to merely create a semblance is immensely appalling. It isn’t easy to digest a maker like Yogesh, the man behind the passable Chintakayala Ravi, set his bar so low.
On the flip side, you wouldn’t have minded the punch lines streaming your way, if it were a star burdened to cater to his fan base. As a result, it’s hard to imagine a Naga Shaurya being trapped in the shoes of a Ravi Teja. For a moment, he is the man who can do anything for money and the next instant, when he sees a debt-ridden elderly person, his benevolent side takes precedence.
The film’s character sketches, similarly, have nothing to vouch for. While for the heroine Sonarika, she hardly has an identity; put the role or the performance aside, spare her work around the bushes, beds and screaming for help from her man, who just isn’t the badass gangster the film may have deserved.
A result more manufactured than made, going by the rhyming one liners dished, it’s tempting to call Jadoogadu, a tragic outing and by a far stretch, one without magic.
