Admirable film.

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

What a freaking movie. So many twists and turns. Absolutely intense from start to finish.

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

This is one of those movies where you would feel like you just wasted your time and energy by watching this. The movie has the same storyline that is getting repeated since ages. None of the actors had the chance of proving their best. Most of them including character artists or even comedians didn't get enough time and script to gain some applause. Of course, it isn't their fault anyways. There are a lot of villains and bad guys but none of them are menacing. Many might not like the concept of a female villain but still Rati is not menacing in any way. One of the main even more wasted efforts is Sonal Chauhan. Even though she gets all the marks for glamor and performance, her character is as if it is just placed so that they can get a song and couple of scenes to tick the glamor quotient. But at least, she does this much better than that of Legend movie. Anjali did best here given that her character has some importance.Coming to technical aspects, production values are average and camera work is OK. Thaman's music is average but would work well with typical mass dances. It seems background music is done by somebody else, but it looks average too and doesn't help the poor screenplay anyways. Finally, the direction is average too. The screenplay and direction neither elevated hero level scenes nor they worked with villains nor they worked with comedians and other actors. Dialogues by Ratnam are as good as that of Legend's but these days I'm not sure why there should be a lot of misplaced and unnecessary build up dialogs for most of the movies.The only saving grace in the movie is, NBK who often does his best. He tried pretty hard to dance well but it isn't his fault with choreography. He looked good and did his best. Apart from him, Anjali gave her best and Sonal too did her best even though her role is negligible.Finally, there is no way I can say this is a must watch even for a casual time pass. Just a wasted effort, but, at least, better than Lion movie.

Undoubtedly, Balakrishna is the heart and soul of the film. He is exceptionally good in both his characters and carries the entire film on his shoulders. The way Srivas has showcased Balayya as Dictator is pretty impressive and elevates the super star to another level. Be it his costumes, dialogue delivery and dances, Balakrishna does a superb job. Anjali looks beautiful and shares a superb chemistry with Balakrishna. All her scenes during the second half have come out extremely well.Interval bang and the flash back episode in Delhi are decent. Some confrontation scenes between Balakrishna and Rati Agnihotri have been executed well and elevate the film to a decent level. #Lion is back