They Call Him OG

way flawless but it's just what I went in hoping for. Pure Fanboy stuff. It is exactly what was promised by director Sujeeth and Music director Thaman S and they don't disappoint. Pawan Kalyan's screen Presence and acting capabilities are brilliantly presented here in this complete Fanboy treat. Really loved the Japanese integration to the story which establishes it's core. There are 3 pillars to this movie. Sujeeth, though a little weak in the writing department, is brilliant in presenting Pawan Kalyan in the way people have been intending to watch on the big screen. He makes great use of Kalyan's powerful eyes which I absolutely loved. I don't think I've seen these kind of elevations for a Telugu actor in a very long time. Kudos to him for making it work despite the logistical difficulties he might have faced due to PK's busy political schedule. Needs some kind of determination. I have no words for the songs and score composed by Thaman. The man literally was so confident about his work that he kept hyping it up in all the events and interviews and still managed to exceed expectations which were already sky high. He literally was like " Pawan Sir you just walk, I'll do the rest". What an OST and score man. Will be remembered for ages. One of the best in Indian cinema. The score gave me literal goosebumps and elevated even few of the sub-par scenes. You have a new fan in me Thaman. I'm gonna rewatch it just for the music. That "Travelling Soldier" remix had me screaming in the theatres. And the third pillar obviously is Pawan Kalyan. I'm not a PK fan but man was he so good as Gambheera. He had a magnetic presence and the larger than life aura on the screen. It's not your typical PK performance. It's a very restrained and subtle added with an unhinged fierce beast like transformation whenever needed. The man performs the Katana fights, the Dojo fights with great flexibility and ease. There's swagger and style to him. Probably my favourite Pawan Kalyan performance. His dialogue delivery is brilliant and the Japanese Haiku he sings called Washi O Washi is works so well and placed nicely in the the screenplay. Kalyan gives a solid all-round act and I'm sure people are gonna celebrate it for sometime. The cinematography by Ravi K. Chandran and Manoj Paramahamsa is visually striking and has a neo-noir gangster 1980s feel to it. So many beautiful visuals of which I loved the fire shot during the intro of Gambheera and that camera rotating shot near Gateway of India. The production design by A.S. Prakash is on point capturing the Japanese vibe along with the retro 80s of Bombay perfectly. Few of the VFX shots are really bad where you can clearly make out how the green screen looks so artificial in the background. That's just unforgivable. The costume design team should be given a lot of credit. Every single outfit that Pawan Kalyan and Emraan Hashmi donned looked so fashionable and slick. The action choreography is really nice but I wish the Interval fight was much more effective. Emraan Hashmi is the typical commerical villian but whatever he's been asked to do he does it with a midas touch. The man looks so dapper and elegant and he is a great antagonist opposite Kalyan. I wish his character was flushed out more but the way he is presented is really nice. Sriya Reddy gets a good role and she's fierce and strong in it. Priyanka is surprisingly good as Gambheera's wife and the love story is really pleasant and cute but it gets predictable. Prakash Raj and Arjun Das are good as the support but I wish Das' character was written better. The emotional connect of the film isn't much but it's just enough to keep you interested. Could've taken time with the emotions. To talk about what worked for me, I really loved the introduction of Gambheera with his Katana action sequence and I absolutely loved the 30 minutes post Interval. The interval sequence gives you the high but it could've been better. The climax sequence and the post credit scenes are really satisfactory and the way Sujeeth is building his cinematic universe is exciting for me. Sujeeth the director is brilliant but the writer in him needs improvement. It feels like there are so many ideas, concepts and subplots that he has thought of, but couldn't integrate them all or flush them out properly in the 2 and half hour screenplay. I can see the potential of the ideas but it doesn't completely materialise onto the screen. There's a lot going on and sometimes it gets a bit confusing. But at the end I feel very relieved and satisfied that a movie with a lot of hype surrounding it's release actually kept up with the hype and didn't disappoint.