Written and directed by Radha Krishna Kumar and produced under the banner of UV creations and T-series, ‘Radhe Shyam’ is a period drama set in the backdrop of Europe in the 1970’s starring pan-India star Prabhas and Pooja Hegde in the lead roles.
‘Radhe Shyam’ is a story about two lovers whose destiny perhaps won’t let them ever be together. It is a story about Vikram Aditya (Prabhas) and his lady love Prerna (Pooja Hegde). Vikram Aditya is a world-renowned palmist whose prediction never fails. He doesn’t believe in love because according to him there’s no trace of love lines in his palm. But, he’s all up for ‘flirtationships’. On the other hand, there’s Prerna (Pooja Hegde), a doctor by profession, who believes in science more than astrology and has a weird hobby of dangerously leaning out of the trains.
The two meet on a train journey and end up falling in love with each other unaware of what destiny holds for them ahead. Prerna is suffering from a fatal disease and has only two months left with her. But, looking at her palm Vikram Aditya predicts that she is going to live for a hundred years. Who triumphs in this battle of love and destiny? Will the Einstein of palmistry fail this time? To get answers to more questions like these one needs to watch the movie.
Performance wise, it is Prabhas who carries the film on his shoulders. The actor who is making his comeback to the celluloid after the 2019 release ‘Saaho’ gives a highly convincing performance as Vikram Aditya. Barring a few minor flaws here and there, he looks absolutely handsome and charming on the screen. Pooja Hegde looks equally gorgeous as Prerna but the two together fail to spark off any chemistry for a love story like this.
In the supporting role, there is senior actress Bhagyashree who plays mother to Prabhas but doesn’t have much to offer in the role. Satya Raj who appears in the pivotal role of Vikram Aditya’s guru, Paramahamsa gives a fine performance. Kunal Roy Kapoor fills the frame with some light hearted comedy scenes. Sachin Khedkar too is decent as Prerna’s uncle. Whereas, actors like Jagapathi Babu, Jayaram and Murali Sharma among others are totally under-used looking at their calibre.
The background score composed by S. Thaman for the Telugu version and Sanchit Balhara and Ankit Balhara for the Hindi version is one of the few good things that come out of the movie. All the songs in the film are just amazing which takes the movie forward in a flow and you just can’t stop humming them after leaving the theatre. Whereas, the cinematographer Manoj Paramahamsa captures the beauty of Rome perfectly through his lens, making the movie visually grand.
To sum up, it is Pooja Hegde and Prabhas’s chemistry which is the major drawback of the film and for that the actors aren’t to be blamed anywhere. The two have done their individual parts quite well but the characters written for them lack depth to bring out a love story that creates an emotional connection with the audience. Besides this there are a lot of characters and incidents about which there is no back story. We are just left confused and wondering why and how it is so.
Basically, ‘Radhe Shyam’ is nothing but a boring and slow paced love saga which I felt was made just to convey that neither science nor astrology is always hundred percent true. It’s we the humans who create our future with our own actions. Pheww, did we really need 140 minutes for this? However, if you love Prabhas then you can give it a try as the pan-India star dons a romantic hero character after a long time!
You can now watch ‘Radhe Shyam’ at a theatre near you in Hindi, Telugu, Malayalam and Tamil languages.
