Youngsters Vikas Vasishta, and Priya Vadlamani's Mukhachitram directed by Gangadhar attracted the attention of all with interesting trailers and teasers. The cameo of Vishwak Sen increased hype over the project. The film is releasing on December 9 and its OTT streaming will be done after the end of its theatrical run. The film's OTT partner is yet to be finalized. Let us find out what Mukhachitram offered to viewers.
Mukhachitram's story is all about shocking incidents happening in the life of a newly married couple and the effects. Dr.Rajkumar (Vikas Vasishta) marries a beautiful village girl Mahati (Priya Vadlamani). When everything is going happily, life takes a shocking turn when Rajkumar's friend Maya (Ayesha Khan), who loves him a lot suffers a fatal accident. To find out those shocking incidents and how it is connected to Dr. Neeladri Varma (Sunil), Dr Satya (Chaitanya Rao), famous lawyer Vasishta (Ravishankar), and an amateur advocate Viswamitra (Vishwaksen) enjoy Mukhachitram on the screen.
Mukhachitram's story selected by Gangadhar highlighted the social evils in a thrilling manner. Gangadhar started off the narration in a slow manner and continued in the same vein highlighting the character of the protagonist Vikas Vasishta to the core before unraveling the mystery. Though the idea is right it ended in repetitive scenes and thus the story did not move forward till the interval block. The Interval block is fine setting the one for the gripping second half. The second half narration picks up the pace and from then on it went on in a smooth manner.
The scenes during the pre-climax and climax are elevated with the impactful performances of all the actors. The court scenes involving Ravi Shankar and Vishwak Sen gave the much-needed impetus to the story. The scenes took the film to another level. But illogical elements and over-the-board dialogues turned the entire court proceedings into an artificial one. The natural look went missing with Vishwak Sen and Ravi Shankar came up with histrionics rather than questioning and cross-questioning the witnesses and victims and the accused. This robbed the film of a realistic and natural feel.
The direction of Gangadhar is fine while the screenplay by Sandeep Raj is uneven. It turned out to be a roller coaster ride reaching new heights in a few scenes and at times going down completely. However, the message he selected with his story, a few twists and turns, and the blending of cosmetic surgery with domestic violence is something new on the screen. He came with powerful, impactful emotion-filled dialogues which still connect chords with the viewers.
Vikas Vasishta slipped into the role effortlessly. He with his ease showed good variations to surprise all. But at times his role became unidimensional as the director tried to stress and highlight his innocence on the screen. Priya Vadlamani looked good as an innocent village girl. She even came up with different expressions showing her transformation as Maya. Chaitanya Rao as Dr.Satya is good. Ayesha Khan as Maya did well. Ravi Shankar played the role of the lawyer tailormade for him. Mass Ka Das Vishwak Sen made his presence felt in the cameo. However, both Ravi Shankar and Vishwak Sen went overboard with their dialogues and antics and turned loud. Others performed according to their roles.
Kaala Bhairava's music is ok but he elevated the scenes with his background music. Sreenivas Bejugam with his cinematography created the right kind of atmosphere to the viewers giving them a thrilling experience. Kodati Pawan Kalyan's editing is ok but could have been better, especially in the first half which dragged till the interval. Production values are good.
Altogether, Gangadhar along with Sandeep Raj came up with a story to thrill viewers and at the same time highlight the important social evil. To some extent, they are successful as they penned powerful dialogues to connect chords with the masses. But for all the intent, they missed many logics, especially in the pre-climax and climax. They simply forgot the fact that the video evidence is not admissible in court and the judges do not go by emotions but instead go by hard facts and proofs and questioning of the clients and the witnesses. Sandeep Raj and Gangadhar tried to play to the gallery highlighting the emotions rather than coming up with a logical conclusion. Had they come up with a logical conclusion and interesting scenes showcasing the reality, Mukhachitram would have made a strong impact. Altogether Mukhachitram turned out to be an ordinary fair though it has many qualities to reach new heights. Sandeep Raj for all his creativity and talent offered only a cosmetic solution to the serious problem. Considering all these points, Cinejosh goes with a 2 rating to Mukhachitram.