Raju Gari Gadhi 2 movie review: Nagarjuna powers a spooky thriller
Cast: Nagarjuna, Samantha, Seerath Kapoor, Rao Ramesh, Naresh, Vennela Kishore, Praveen, Ashwin and others
Director: Ohmkar
After the great success of Raju Gari Gadhi, director Ohmkar has come up with Raju Gari Gadhi 2 in which Nagarjuna plays the lead. A point of interest is that Nagarjuna’s daughter-in-law Samantha plays a special role in the film. This is the first film releasing for Samantha after she married Naga Chaitanya on October 6.
The film is about three friends, Ashwin (Ashwin), Ravi (Vennela Kishore) and Praveen (Praveen) who run a beach resort. A couple of scary incidents leads them to believe that a ghost haunts their resort. They take the help of a mentalist named Rudra (Nagarjuna), who arrives at the resort and starts investigating. He finds that a woman spirit is behind the strange happenings. He feels that the spirit needs help and so he tries to find out who she is and why she haunts the resort. His investigation leads to some shocking and interesting incidents. Rudra helps the woman spirit and finds out why she wants to take revenge.
Director Ohmkar is also a popular television anchor and his first foray into films, Raju Gari Gadhi, was a success. Raju Gari Gadhi 2 is not a sequel to it, but uses the same title to get attention. It is in the same genre of horror comedy, though. The basic plot of the film is borrowed from the Malayalam film Pretham as the director himself has said. But he has completely changed it to suit the Telugu nativity and also added a few characters and strong emotional scenes that lead to the climax. The film begins with the regular comic and horror scenes, but once Nagarjuna enters, the story becomes more interesting. The character Nagarjuna plays is very magnetic and one is totally absorbed by it. The end, too, does not follow the regular formula — the director creates an emotional drama that lasts nearly 25 minutes and which is quite gripping. The scenes between Samantha and Nagarjuna have come out very well. The director also cleverly inserts a message that relates to girls and women.
Nagarjuna plays the serious character of the mentalist with grace. It is interesting that Nagarjuna is getting his best roles in his 50s. It’s also good to see him not dancing about and romancing girls — this is a role that required acting prowess and Nagarjuna shows that he has it. Maybe other actors may now be open to doing this kind of role, seeing how successful it is. Though Samantha’s role is small, she is stunning and definitely the highlight of the film. Actually she appears mostly at the climax of this film, in the last half hour, but even then she overshadows all the others. Rao Ramesh appears in a cameo, but makes his presence felt. He fits exactly the character he plays. Seerath Kapoor sizzles, and Praveen, Kishore, and Ashwin provide the much-needed entertainment. Shakala Shankar is there in a few comic scenes.
The other two important assets of the film are the music and dialogues. S.S. Thaman’s background score is among his best. His music throughout the film is one of its big plus points. The dialogues by Abburi Ravi are thought-provoking and emotional. The dialogues between Samantha and Nagarjuna are emotional and are also connected to them both in real life. The cinematography is also good. Raju Gari Gadhi 2 is both a horror comedy and an emotional drama. Nagarjuna and Samantha give excellent performances and director Ohmkar has orchestrated all the various elements to make another successful film.
