Vaddu Babu!

Believe it, you are nuts. Watch it, you are tolerant. Walk out, you are intelligent. With those promos and pics, you expect a lot of jokes at the expanse of the central character- the film over reaches your expectations. It banks heavily on crass cracks and is grossly politically incorrect. From the word ’go’ you cringe. Those who came out of curiosity, compulsion or incurable carelessness, are called to pay a heavy price. They rue the decision of every moment of the 143 minutes running time of the move.

The Allari Naresh brand is lost in the new mass of creativity. The resultant product seems as insufferable as that ‘African encephalitis’ bug that infects Ravi- who becomes Laddu Babu (Naresh). The paradox is that the barbs come not from strangers and viewers but his own dad. The entire script is so unbelievable and the narration so non-descript you wonder if the entire film is the product of some somnambulism or a comatose aberration. To belittle a film is easy. Most filmmakers see critics as their professional foe and strongly believe that their product gets unwarranted comments from the latter. Surely director Ravi Babu would prove to be an exception to this.

The director is also the story writer. This means he gives image to his own imagination. None to blame. Single hand effort. There come moments when even the very lay audience develops a frown for being robbed of a couple of hours when out of home. No, not the highbrow critic who expects a perfect film, no not the one who expects a masterpiece as if this was from the likes of K Vishwanath, but even the guy who is resigned to the kind of films that ….. spoke of would find this outing amiss.

Laddu Babu (Naresh) dreams of being a drag queen waylaid by men who would want to rape him and he being slim. He wakes up to the daily reality of being obese (200 kgs.) His grandmother and then his mom on the way to executing a will in his favour die natural deaths in the process. For dad Krishtiah (Kota along with a horrendous wig) to inherit the property, Laddu Babu requires to marry. Dad taunts the obese son on a regular basis and makes crude attempts to get his son married. A group of friends including Giri Babu, Rallapalli, hang around witnessing all this. In the meanwhile, Laddu Babu does various odd jobs from playing part time gardener, to distributing pamphlets, to playing statue at a chocolate shop. It is here that he notices a regular customer Poorna and falls for her. She is blissfully unaware of the guy. Around the same time, Laddu Babu is stalked by kid Murthy (master Atul) who plays every dubious prank to befriend Laddu Babu. Soon they become friends and Laddu Babu goes to live with Murthy and his widowed mom (Bhumika). There are villains and others with an eye on Murthy’s property and are planning to kidnap him. Meanwhile for comic relief we have Krishtiah trying to get married and have a whole lot of comedy actors including Brahmanandam, Ali, Jaiprakash Reddy, MS Narayana LB Sriram, Telangana Shakuntala, Krishna Bhagwan and Raghu Babu surfacing to make you laugh .

In the meanwhile, Laddu Babu plays on the confidence imposed on him and runs away with money from Bhumika’s vault for a bariatric surgery. When the mother and son are sought to be kidnapped the latter suffers a bronchial attack. Now Laddu Babu has to return and fulfil the dying wish of Murthy. Nothing in all this is inspiring. There is a postscript which has a scene involving Kota and Venu Madhav- a good laugh. It almost appears that having had a good one at our expense the filmmaker decides to give us a minute of it.