BOTTOM LINE
Boring Ride
OUR RATING
1.75/5
PLATFORM
Aha Video
What Is the Film About?
A Psycho is on a spree of eliminating girls. He is an ambulance driver and often gets away as the ambulance is given free passage. One day, he is after Tulasi a cursed girl who runs away from a sadist owner to his father in Mangalore. Police and Vishnu (Anand Deverakonda) who falls in love with her at first sight try to rescue her. How that operation happens is the story all about.
Performances
This is the fourth film of Anand Deverakonda and his second Direct-to-OTT release. Anand has severe screen presence and performance issues. Except for Middle-Class Melodies to some extent, he struggled in all the films. Highway is no different.
He often tries to mask his inadequacies by choosing content-driven films that do not need him to expose more of himself. That is a good idea but the problem lies in the bad writing he is presented with. The character of Vishnu is the weakest hero characterization in recent times. He gets to do nothing in the film. In such a character, his lack of screen presence and struggle to emote are exposed big time.
Forget about the performances and screen presence, there is very little screen time for Anand. We get a feeling if his portions were chopped off to reduce the runtime.
Manasa Radhakrishnan plays the female lead. She plays a character that suffers so much in life. It almost requires her to cry from start to end with a single expression. She does that alright. Abhishek Banerjee is menacing as the psycho villain. Saiyami Kher is okay in the role of a cop. Comedian Sathya is wasted in a small role.
Analysis
Cinematographer cum director KV Guhan bagged a hit with Nandamuri Kalyan Ram’s 118 in 2019. He followed it with another failure, WWW released directly on OTT. He came up with another thriller, Highway which also landed on OTT (Aha Video).
Highway is a road trip thriller comprising three tracks – A psychopath ambulance driver and the police, Vishnu, a photographer who is on his way to an event in Bengaluru, and Tulasi who is running away from her father who abandoned her mother a long ago. Vishnu falls for Tulasi and the psycho is after her on expected lines.
The psycho and his sadist acts are introduced initially. These portions generate some interest initially but the story loses steam once the love track happens. The heroine may be because her looks or characterization do not evoke interest in those portions. Anand Deverakonda’s lack of screen presence also ensures that the chemistry does not happen. A song that comes here is good to ears and eyes but does not gel in the proceedings.
On a parallel track, we have a police investigation happening. This track and the killing spree are supposed to be the backbone of the thriller. They should generate interest in the story with some thrills and twists. But nothing happens. Everything runs on predictable lines and gives us a repetitive feeling.
The hero as expected brings a clue (courier track) to solve the case but it appears silly. The director appears to run out of ideas to give a proper closure to the story. Once that happens, everything becomes predictable and boring once again. The climax is another sham. The so-called twist in the name of divine intervention is silly.
Finally, Highway is that kind of thriller that does not have any thrills. The narration is flat right from start to end with boring and repetitive scenes. Only the villain portions show some promise. The graph drops further towards the end. The makers have taken a smart choice by offloading the film to OTT.
Music and Other Departments?
As said earlier, KV Guhan failed to come up with a good script with taut narration and interesting thrills. However, he did a good job with some good visuals. The visuals of the highway and the forests are neatly shown. Simon K King came up with an impressive background score. It has worked very well in some portions. There is a single romantic song that is good but disturbs the flow of the film. Editing is patchy with no smooth flow in places. Production Values are good.
Highlights?
Abhishek Banerjee who played the baddie
Camera work
BGM
Short Runtime
Drawbacks?
Poor Hero Characterization
Romantic Track
Poor cat and mouse game
Lack of Thrills and Twists
Silly Climax
Did I Enjoy It?
No
Will You Recommend It?
No
Highway Telugu OTT Aha Movie Review by M9News
