CAST: N. T. Rama Rao Jr, Ram Charan, Ajay Devgn, Alia Bhatt, Olivia Morris, Samuthirakani, Shriya Saran, Alison Doody, Ray Stevenson, Rajeev Kanakala, Rahul Ramakrishna

DIRECTOR: S. S. Rajamouli

BLUF

The film is set in the 1920s when British rule was at its peak in India. A small girl from a tribal village in Telangana is taken away as a slave by the British officers. In comes the mighty Bheem(NTR) who belongs to the same tribe and takes on the responsibility of bringing the girl back. But he has to go through a mighty British cop Ram (Ram Charan) who is on his own goal against the British. What will Bheem do now? How will he face Ram? What is Ram’s personal goal? Will Bheem and Ram patch up for a common cause? To know the answers, you need to watch the film on the big screens.

THE MEAT AND THE POTATOES

Alia Bhatt’s Tollywood debut, with the ever-loved Ram Charan and Jr NTR, with the surprise twist of Ajay Devgyn and many many more.
We set the scene in the village of Gond where a little tribal girl Malli, played by the talent Twinkle Sharma, is drawing on the hand of the British governors wife, played by Alison Doody. Doody, better known as lady Scott decides to buy Malli and take her home much to the dismay of her mother, the lovely Ahmareen Anjum. The scene switches to a mob on British Government officials, and we get the first glimpse of our iconic hero, Ram Charan, saving the day as usual, but in a weird twist of events, working as an officer for the British? In contract, we see JR NTR, in the woods hunting or should I rather say being hunted by wild animals in the most action packed entrance and impeccably done CGI work we have seen to date. JR NTR now sets off on his mission to track down Malli as he serves as his tribes savior and Ram Charan is on his quest to become an official officer with the British forces, he’s currently in training. The British government, alerted that someone is trying to track down the governor’s wife’s little playmate, state that any officer who finds NTR, will be promoted to special officer. Now both our heroes have quests and off they go in this unlikely story where they end up meeting, never divulge their true identities to each other, and become the best of friends. JR NTR embodying the force of water and Ram Charan the spitting image of fire, they get caught in this cat and mouse metaphorical chase of which is more powerful.

Now lets dive into the meat and potatoes. Starting with the Graphics. Cinematography  was done by K. K. Senthil Kumar and editing by A. Sreekar Prasad. Sabu Cyril is the film’s production designer whilst V. Srinivas Mohan supervised the visual effects. To date, this has been the most graphically beautiful film ot come out of Tollywood. Cinematography is off the charts and makes up for any weakness in storyline. Camera work and angles are always clean and clear. The visuals and the vfx, is some of the most powerful work we have e seen come from Telugu cinema. The action shots, the stage combat and action sequences is absolutely chefs kiss, it is a stunning visual masterpiece if not anything else. SO we give the graphics 20/10.

The acting: Ajay Devgyn plays Ram Charan’s father who self sacrifices himself in Ram’s backstory. Shriya Saran plays his mother who is shot, and the highly anticipate Alia Bhatt plays Ram’s love interest, Seetha. What we thought was clever was every time Bhatt was on screen, the director and cinematographer did their best to make her face away from the camera so you cannot see her mouth the words, because we assume her grasp on Telugu is not as strong as it should be, resourceful and adaptive. Nevertheless, her silent acting was just as beautiful. We give major props to everyone in the British royalty, Jennifer played by the lovely Olivia Morris, was the pinnacle of elegance and grace. Both heroes themselves proving time and time again that they are gifted storytellers. Twinkle Sharma making her film debut, the most promising young talent of the year. For the acting we give this movie: 10/20

The storyline: ehhhh inconsistencies. As with typical Telugu movies, we see a lack of continuity in places like the water scenes. JR NTR’s motivation and backstory, a little weak, and told in under two minutes. But Ram Charan’s backstory more than makes up for it. Logic, as usual doesn’t exist in our fight scenes. Which we’ll get into but for now we rate the troy line a 7/10.

The action scenes: the stage combat the fight scenes, even the dance strength and choreography intensity were highly commendable. Ending fight scene, a clever way to use natural rooted weapons against high tech. unrealistic? yes. We also see some Inconsistency with cgi where animals disappear during fight scene. 10/10

The soundtrack and background score: The incorporation of music and dance is comical in the cutest and yet unrealistic to the storyline way. Appreciation for brown culture in many of the songs – great touch. Some May disagree, but the song during the flogging scene was actually the emotional catharsis the story needed and the Naatu hit song, well what more do we really have to say about that? The ending song that covers the happy ever after and pays an ode to all of India freedom fighters? Stunning work

The audience are told that RRR is the story of Alluri Seeta Rama Raju and Komaram Bheem. The film only uses the names of these freedom fighters as reference.

Though a tad bit too long, RRR is huge in every aspect. Rajamouli introduces the key characters of the film as a sight to behold even when the characters take too long to take off and mostly only get activated into the real story action after the interval.

 Be it the tiger chase sequence of NTR or the whistle invoking entry of Ram Charan, Rajamouli gives crowd frenzy moments to a movie just built for the theaters. He creates the characters arcs to get the audience interest and hooks you into the story but then he makes you wait.

It has been three and half years since we have seen NTR on screen. The Nandamuri actor makes up for his prolonged absence and is mind-blowing as Bheem. The simplicity, screen presence will move the audience especially in the patriotic scenes. Probably, one can say that RRR is NTR’s best performance to date.

Ram Charan gets to show his range as an actor.  The chemistry between Charan and NTR is fabulous. RRR relies heavily on their chemistry to tell the story and it is indeed a treat to see them together.

Alia Bhatt makes a good Telugu debut and suits the role to perfection. Ajay Devgan hits it out of the park again and is the special surprise of the film and the star hero does his best to create an impact. Shreya also gets a small but impactful role.

DVV Danayya’s production is fantastic. Music by Keeravani is hummable, but the BGM will surely evoke goosebumps. The camerawork by Senthil Kumar is terrific.

The production design by Sabu Cyril by superb. The British empire setup, props used, and the sets are large than life. Costumes by Rama Rajamouli are authentic and especially those done for Alia Bhatt are incredible. Songs are choreographed phenomenally. Editing is top notch and three hours of runtime does not feel lengthy at all.

SS Rajamouli has definitely made a masterpiece here.

 RRR is also special because every character had a proper storyline and validated in its arc. Rajamouli narrates the film in a way that there is no dull moment on screen at any point of time. With RRR, he has once again proves that he is a master of storytelling.