Fahadh Faasil's Telugu Debut Gets Mixed Reviews
Fahadh Faasil's first Telugu film as a solo lead got praise for him and Ssara Palekar, and doubts about pacing. Ratings range from 2 to 3 out of 5.
Don't Trouble The Trouble, which opened on Oct. 2, is Fahadh Faasil's first Telugu film as a solo lead. Critics we read like him and like the child actor beside him. They fault the pacing and the writing. The ratings we found range from 2 to 3 out of 5.
The film
Shashank Yeleti wrote and directed the fantasy comedy-drama, which Arka Media Works produced and S. S. Rajamouli presented, according to The Indian Express. Fahadh Faasil plays Suri, and Ssara Palekar plays Divya. The Hindu gives a runtime of 158 minutes, and the Indian Express says 2 hours 38 minutes, which is the same length. Kaala Bhairava composed the music and Brad Francis shot the film in Hyderabad.
The two reviews describe Suri differently. The Hindu's Sangeetha Devi Dundoo calls him an ambulance driver who tries to kidnap a child for ransom and finds trouble. The Indian Express's Yashaswini Sri calls him a small-time street magician and con artist. We have not seen the film and cannot say which description fits the opening better. Both agree that he meets a girl, Divya, and her beagle, Snoopy.
What critics praised
Dundoo writes that Fahadh, Ssara Palekar and Snoopy are fantastic, and that the pre-interval episode is a riot. She says Fahadh is convincing in portraying Suri's change of heart, and that his Telugu diction can occasionally distract while adding authenticity for those who have followed his Malayalam and Tamil films. She calls Ssara Palekar a terrific find.
Yashaswini Sri writes that Fahadh is the best thing about the film, which she calls both a compliment and a criticism. She says his performance is sincere, committed and technically impressive, especially given that he performs entirely in Telugu. She writes that an actor of his calibre should not be the only reason to watch a film with this backing. She calls Ssara Palekar the film's discovery.
What critics faulted
The Hindu says the Old City episode around Charminar is populated by stock characters, that the goons are caricatures, and that the magic tricks become repetitive in the second half. It calls the film partially enjoyable and says it needed more magic in the writing.
The Indian Express is harsher. It gave the film 2 out of 5, calls the pacing sluggish and the humour patchy, and says the runtime is at least 20 minutes too long. It says Saurabh Sachdeva, Subbaraju, Venkatesh Kakumanu and Mahesh Manjrekar are under-utilised, and that Kaala Bhairava's score is a letdown.
The Times of India's ETimes gave the film 3 out of 5, and its review says the film loses its way in the second half and that tighter editing would have helped. The Hollywood Reporter India's headline calls it a sweet but beige children's film. Onmanorama's headline says Fahadh anchors a charming but uneven fantasy.
The opening
The Times of India reported, citing Sacnilk, that the film opened at Rs 1.65 crore net in India across 1,224 shows with 25.8 percent occupancy. The Telugu version earned Rs 1.44 crore, the Malayalam version Rs 17 lakh and the Tamil version Rs 4 lakh. A tracker table on baapofmovies lists the film at Rs 4.41 crore net by Oct. 18. These are tracker estimates, and the Times of India notes that totals may change as data is updated.
Why it matters
Fahadh Faasil's Wikipedia entry describes a career of critically acclaimed Malayalam and Tamil work and a National Film Award. A first solo Telugu lead is a step into a new market. The reviews suggest the performance travels well and the material does not.
What we could not confirm
We could not reconcile the two descriptions of Suri, so we have reported both. We have not seen the film. We read The Hindu, the Indian Express and ETimes in part and the other reviews through headlines. We do not have a producer figure for the box office.
Sources
*Cover photo: AhamBrahmasmi, Wikimedia Commons, *[*https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fahadh_Faasil_at_Kuttanpillayude_Sivarathri_Audio_launch.jpg*](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fahadh_Faasil_at_Kuttanpillayude_Sivarathri_Audio_launch.jpg)* (CC BY-SA 4.0).*