Top anchor Suma Kanakala and senior actor Rajeev Kanakala’s son Roshan has turned into a full-fledged hero with ‘Bubblegum’. Written and directed by ‘Kshanam’ and ‘Krisha & His Leela’ fame Ravikanth Perepu, the teaser and trailer attracted a lot of people. The songs generated a decent buzz too and the movie promised to be a youth-oriented romantic drama. Let us see if the film lived up to its hype or no
Story:
Aditya alias Adi (Roshan) is a pakka Hyderabadi youngster with a middle class background. He aspires to become a DJ and works at a night club. He meets Janhvi aka Janu (Maanasa Choudhary) at a party and instantly gets attracted to her. He stalks her everywhere and learns that she is highly rich. Janu doesn’t believe in love and marriage. She decides to have fun with Adi initially but gradually starts liking him as well. They both grow quite close to each other which frustrates Janu’s ex-boyfriend. Due to an unfortunate situation at Janu’s birthday party, they breakup leaving Adi in a lot of angst and frustration as he gets humiliated. What happens after that? Will Adi get his revenge? Will Adi and Janu reunite? What happens to their love at the end? How will they overcome their class divide? Answers to all these questions form the rest of the story.
Analysis:
Most of the movies try to showcase how parents are against love and how the youngsters win at the end. But the new generation is so mature that they don’t need villains in life. It is their own mind which acts as their guide as well as the devil. Their insecurities, their lack of clarity, their aggressive attitude and their toxicity is what drives them crazy most of the times. It is what the director wanted to emphasize on with ‘Bubblegum’. The movie deals with a mature theme where it showcases how important it is to prioritize ourselves first rather than sacrificing everything for love. But the execution of this storyline is far from perfect.
There are lot of entertaining moments in the film. It starts off quite well and the characters are established in a convincing manner. The scenes revolving hero and his family along with his two friends were designed in a light-hearted manner. The love track too begins well and audience set themselves for a breezy urban love story with a good dose of romance. But proceedings get too slow as the movie goes on. Despite the good chemistry between the lead pair, the love track gets a bit artificial and unconvincing at places. But things start to get interesting during the pre-interval. The intermission point is well-designed and it comes off brilliantly. Roshan does very well and his emotions make you root for the character. The perfect interval scene sets the stage perfectly for the second half.
The second half is a bit of a letdown as one would expect the hero to focus more on career but the hero too keeps on talks about ‘Izzat’ and ‘Aukat’ a lot. But it is all limited to one song and the love track takes centre stage once again. The movie takes the regular route of heroine trying to win back the hero and track gets a bit tedious to watch. The movie tests the patience of the audience after a certain point but the drama gets the film back on track during the pre-climax. The end portions are well-executed and it is the performances which lift the film to a large extent. The ending is quite mature but it leaves a mixed reaction among the audience. Overall, ‘Bubblegum’ is a new-age romantic drama that dwells on a mature point but falters during execution. While the acting of the lead cast and supporting actors are big plus points, it is snail pace works against the film.
Performances:
Roshan did well as a Hyderabadi guy. His boy-next-door looks worked well in this movie. There is an actor in him and we can clearly witness it during the emotional sequences. His body language suited the role perfectly and there is an ease in his performance. The rugged look is impressive and the expressive eyes of Roshan conveyed a lot of emotions. He made a very good debut with ‘Bubblegum’.
Maanasa Choudhary looked quite glamorous in the movie. She shared great chemistry with Roshan and raised temperatures during songs and intimate scenes. She did well in the emotional scenes as well and delivered a good performance in terms of acting. It is Jairam Eshwar who steals the show as hero’s father. His dialogue delivery and acting entertains the audience and the father-son bond is one of the main highlights of the movie.
Bindu Chandramouli is good as well. Harshavardhan and Anu Hasan are underutilized. Harsha Chemudu’s comedy did not work out while Kiran Macha, Anannyaa Akulaa, Vishnu, Sanjana and others who played the friends’ roles were decent. Brahmanandam makes a special appearance.
Technicians:
‘Bubblegum’ is a new-age love story and Sricharan Pakala’s songs are trendy. Music plays a key role in this movie and his work is quite evident. While ‘Jilebi’ song is misplaced, the rest of the songs go with the flow of the film. His background works well in a lot of scenes though it is too loud and dominates the proceedings at places. The cinematography by Suresh Ragutu is quite good. He beautifully showcases the contrast between the background of hero and heroine through his visuals which. They are vibrant and delightful. The production design is amazing. The production values are adequate while the editing could have been better as the first half is way too slow.
Ravikanth Perepu takes up a new-age romantic drama once again after ‘Krishna & His Leela’. He excels in getting good performances out of every actor and his presentation of the story is decent as well. But the screenplay is too slow and scenes get a bit repetitive in the second half. The ending is quite mature but too urbane which may receive mixed responses from the public. But he delivers a youth-oriented romantic drama that requires patience at times.
Verdict: ‘Bubblegum’ – Loses Its Sweetness Midway!