RRR review

If the detailed social realism of the Dardenne brothers represents one type of cinema, RRR it is its opposite pole. The three-plus-hour epic of the SS Rajamouli is a riot of outrageous spectacle, gravity-defying acrobatics, colors, song and dance, thrills and a computer-generated menagerie of animals. It looks like the kind of movie that looks great in a Twitter clip, but it’s underwhelming when you sit back and watch it all. But don’t be afraid – RRR (It stands for “Rise! Roar! Revolt!”) Is a big, flashy, understated slice of escapist cinema that’s hilarious from first frame to last.

Set in 1920s India, the plot pits soldier Alluri Sitarama Raju (Ram Charan) and villager Komaram Bheem (NT Rama Rao Jr) against the British Empire, represented by Governor Scott Buxton (Ray Stevenson, terrible) and his couple. vengeful wife Catherine (Alison Doody, who wields a particularly nasty whip to remind him Indiana Jones days), after the British kidnapped Bheem’s younger sister. Raju and Bheem perform fantastically, with the former doing a photographic version of The matrix reloaded‘s’ heavy brawl’ to stop a mal’un, the last one who runs faster than a wolf, then screams at a tiger, then teams up to save a kid in a burning river (don’t ask for help from a motorcycle) , a horse, a rope and a ridiculous timing he puts on Spiderman the bridge saves for shame. All this in the first half hour.

From there, the inventiveness and originality of the action reach dizzying levels, often completely outside the laws of physics. The quality of the visual effects is variable, but it doesn’t matter, partly because Rajamouli has a great eye for cheeky heroic movies and partly because he’s so witty that it’s easy to get carried away (that is to say, there’s a great scene in that. where Raju punches British puppets as they hoist him onto Bheem’s shoulders).

Among the fights are John Woo-style themes (loyalty, brotherhood, identity), weak comedy as Bheem tries to woo English rose Jenny (Olivia Morris) and catchy music: the best of the bunch is a dance while Raju and Bheem are they exhibit the stiff shirts of the Raj as it is done. The plot is jarring and the writing clumsy (“Assault the special forces and capture the bastards”), but it wins thanks to the bravado of Rajamouli, the contagious charisma of Charan and Rama Rao Jr, ace of cinema (the immense talent of MM Keeravani score, the propulsive edition of A. Sreeker Prasad) and the imagination of the stuntman. RRR NEVER ONCE: The final encounters of the Jungle Battle are as fresh as the opening cinematic, which means 185 minutes go by in a digital blink of an eye.