After testing his luck with mass and commercial films, Sai Dharam Tej has come up with a romantic family entertainer Tej I Love You directed by rom com specialist Karunakaran. Will Tej come out of flop streak with this film? Will Tholiprema director play his elixir on Sai? Let’s go into the actual review part:
Tej (Sai Dharam Tej) is a happy go lucky guy who charges money for every work he does including his own family members. He is thrown out of family owing to a mistake. Tej then shifts to his uncle’s house and enroute falls flat for Nandini (Anupama Parameswaran) who comes from London to India.
Over a period of time, Nandini too starts adoring Tej and when she decides to propose her love, she meets with an accident to forget her past. Why Nandini came to India? How Tej resolves Nandini’s problems, though she doesn’t recognize him?
Can anyone forget Tholi Prema which was one of the best and trend setting love stories in Telugu cinema? The same director Karunakaran later made some hilarious romantic films and won appreciations for showing his mark in dealing romance.
Coming to Tej I Love You, he disappointed upright. The film hardly has any engaging moments throughout except a few comedy bits. In fact, the romantic track between lead pair was neither unique nor engaging. Darling Swamy’s screenplay is one of the biggest drawbacks. I Andrew’s cinematography is not up to the mark and editor forgot to chop off many unnecessary scenes that only extended the run time. Songs by Gopi Sundar are just okay wherein BGM is decent. Production values of Creative Commercials are middling.
About performances, Sai Dharam Tej as we all know is a good performer and shined in the role of a spoilt youngster. His mannerisms and energy levels are a treat. He was graceful in dances, comic touch and also in imitating both his uncles Chiranjeevi and Pawan Kalyan.
Anupama Parameswaran looked beautiful in traditional attires and her role was regular. Jayaprakash is time tested as he was given very less space. Anish Kuruvilla gave an expression from start to end. The comedy batch of Prudhvi, Viva Harsha etc. provided entertainment here and there. Other artists made their presence.
Sai Dharam Tej
Few Comedy Scenes
First Half
Regular Story
Sluggish Narration
Music
Second Half
Tej I Love You suffers mainly with regular and ordinary story line. Karunakaran had space to provide enough entertainment but he failed to show the same capability as that of his previous films. When emotions fail to connect, story-telling goes haywire and everything looks artificial and forced. That's the case with Tej.
Karunakaran tried to elevate family emotions in beginning episodes which were artificial. Sai Dharam Tej behaves the same even after Jayaprakash throws him out of house. All such stuff looked just ok. Anupama is introduced in funny manner as she acts like a blind to teach a lesson to SDT who is of the opinion that winning love is not a big deal. The cat-mouse fights between SDT and Anupama bring laughs not so often but boring most of the times. Then the flashback episode where reason behind Anupama’s visit to India is shown is routine. Movie heads to interval with Anupama losing her memory after meeting with accident.
Into second half, SDT makes all efforts to make sure Anupama believe that she is already in love with him before accident. Movie turns bit interesting after SDT and Anupama enter the former’s house. Then, another and unnecessary flashback giving clean chit to SDT was unpersuasive. In no time, another flashback is narrated only for Anupama to develop feelings on SDT.
All in all, Tej I Love is a regular film with some hilarious moments here and there. Had Karunakaran and team put extra efforts on screenplay, final impression on the film would have been different. CJ goes with 2.5 stars and the film can be watched if you enjoy Karunakaran mark comedy in bits and pieces but overall this is a no no Tholiprema.