Rating: 3/10 (Thalanoppi)

Cast: Ravi Teja, Ileana, Sunil, Vennala Kishore, Satya, Ravi Prakash, Tarun Arora, Aditya Menon, Abhimamyu Singh, Vikramjit, Rajveer Singh, Shiyaji Shinde, Subhalekha Sudhakar, Laya and others

Story: Sreenu Vaitla and Vamsi Rajesh Kondaveeti

Screenplay-Dialogues-Direction: Sreenu Vaitla

Music: SS Thaman 

Producers: Naveen Yerneni, Y. Ravi Shankar and Mohan Cherukuri

Banner: Mythri Movie Makers

Format Watched: Amazon Prime

I watched Amar Akbar Anthony on Prime sometime back. The movie was a colossal disaster and thought Sreenu Vaitla couldn't get any worse with his outings. Despite the attempt at a new story, Amar Akbar Anthony fails miserably. Let's find out why in this review.

Plot: A man suffering from Dissociative Identity Disorder has to take revenge against four businessmen for the murder of his family while his past confronts him in the form of his childhood love (Source IMDB).

Performances: Raviteja plays 3 different roles and unfortunately he looks clueless in all of them. We all know he's a fantastic performer but the characterizations honestly give him nothing to work with. His comic timing is impeccable as always but when a film is bad, not even his trademark entertainment can save the movie. He's not even a saving grace to attempt to watch the movie.

Ileana makes a comeback and her looks are evergreen but unfortunately she's out of shape and can't give much to the character in terms of performance. Her own dubbing is good though.

Other than the leads, it's only comedian Sathya that really registered as a spoof on KA Paul. His obnoxious expressions and unorthodox dialogue delivery will make you laugh. But his character doesn't have the scope to make you laugh throughout.

All the regular cast members of a Sreenu Vaitla movie are there but Sunil, Sayaji Shinde, and others are all criminally wasted and are just there as props.

The highlight of the movie is Abhimanyu Singh who plays a special officer of the movie. His role is just something else. So unbelievably dumb.

Direction: It's often hard to find your groove when you're under pressure and even harder to deliver on top of that. Sreenu Vaitla has been forgotten by the Telugu audiences with 3 consecutive rods and this is the 3rd attempt at a comeback. He falls flat on his face once again. On paper, this film plays out like a solid psychological thriller much like Aparichitudu. But in classic Vaitla style, he introduces way too many characters who add nothing to the plot and very stale and outdated comedy. The Akbar character speaks in olden Hindi and its tough to understand what he's saying. And the execution is horrendous. There are so many logical errors in the movie. The biggest must be the representation of the NYPD in the movie. They make them look useless. ANd the so called spoofs on Telugu associations are terrible either. The action doesn't register and the screenplay is very poor. You barely laugh at any moment and the film drags on and and on. The movie is definitely better than Mister because even though it's illogical, the set up and taking seems realistic as compared to a fictional Sword of the Stone kingdom in Bangalore. Overall, Sreenu Vaitla does a terrible job in the direction department once again and makes this movie unbearable at times.

Technicalities: Music and BGM by Thaman SS is very good. The combo of Raviteja and Thaman rarely disappoints and AAA passes in that regard. Cinematography by Venkat C Dileep is excellent. He shows the beauty of New York City in it's fullest form throughout the visuals. Editing by MR Varma is bad. The film is too long for its own good and has way too many pointless scenes. Production Design by AS Prakash is flawless as usual. Dialogues by Sreenu Vaitla are decent. There's nothing memorable like previous films in the past. But that was more due to Gopimohan and Kona Venkat. Fights are useless in the overall scheme of things. Production Values by Mythri Movie Makers are extravagant. They never compromise on the look of their movies irrespective of the content.

Positives: 

+ Cinematography 

Negatives:

- Story 

- Screenplay

- Direction

- Comedy 

- No Logic 

- Everything else 

Analysis and Final Take: Both actor Raviteja and Sreenu Vaitla are going though a rough phase and its quite surprising that Raviteja chose his old friend who is completely out of form to give him a solid hit. He must be regretting his decision after watching the output. To put it simply, Amar Akbar Anthony is a massive disappointment and continues the sorrow for Sreenu Vaitla due to the terrible writing and execution.

The film actually has a very interesting premise that makes for a solid psychological action thriller. But Vaitla's insistence on comedy into the narrative kills the movies prospects from the get go. It starts off with a murder in Long Island and then the story flashes forward to the present. We see the hero and heroine who are Telugu Americans with American accents in the beginning.

The story then keeps going and Raviteja keeps murdering people one after the other and we don't know why. The villains just keep coming and going dressed in fancy suits and they add no value to the plot.

At the same time you have a spoof of NATA with VATA and this results in ridiculously bad and stale comedy. Sathya as KA Paul might make you laugh but the comedy sidetracks the story and way too many subplots involving it are there.

There's another one with Raghubabu and co whether encounter Akbar, a Telugu Muslim who speaks in olden Hindi and they're a bunch of gambling. He is always spewing a bunch on nonsense and we don't know why. Or how Amar become Akbar.

Then Ileana is introduced and it was nice to see her back on the screen but frankly she's wasted. Only after the interval does the flashback get revealed but by then the story is so overdrawn that you probably don't care or have any empathy.

There's another subplot involving Sunil as a thief and if you expect anything like Dubai Seenu level comedy, you're in for a disappointment. If anything it only adds to the headache this movie gives you.

The biggest joke in the film is the portrayal of the New York Police Department aka the NYPD. They're shown as complete fools the entire movie and then work with the FBI and appoint an Indian officer of all people to handle the case in Abhimanyu Singh. Such nonsensical logic.

Why the hell would the NYPD drop the case and hand it over to some random Indian dude who's base isn't even American soil. And then to add to your woes, he takes a stick and beats up some comedians in an interrogation room and this is supposed to comedy in this day and age. His dubbing artist also sucks big time as he does a terrible job.

Further, if the child artists for Raviteja and Ileana are American, how come they both have Indian accents when they're older? Did they travel back to India and live there again to have the accent? Such careless things go in the direction department. There should at least be some sense in it.

Lastly, Raviteja's Anthony character says "I am strong, you are strong, Relax!". He says this about 20-30 times throughout the movie. But by then your patience has run thin and your head is probably spinning.

Overall, Amar Akbar Anthony is a headache inducing movie. Illogical writing, terrible comedy, bad direction, and useless characters cannot save this movie which is a wasted opportunity in the end. I wouldn't even recommend it if you are a die hard fan of Raviteja. Rewatching his old comedy scenes in Venky and Dubai Seenu are far better than this shite.