isaacsundaralingam

Having never watched any of the Baahubali movies before, I have to say that if this is what's being celebrated, then I genuinely worry about the standards of what Indian cinema considers an "epic."

I understand that this four-hour version still has about 60-90 minutes of footage trimmed out, yet it already felt like I'd seen everything I needed to see, and learned everything I needed to know about what Baahubali was really about. What I saw was, at times, interesting, and at other times, insufferable, but never compelling enough to make me want to watch the original films.

The whole experience felt like an over-the-top soap opera, loaded with exaggerated drama and some truly atrocious CGI - something that might have been forgivable if these weren't among the most expensive Indian movies ever made.

Still, at least now I can say I've seen Baahubali, and I can confidently debate anyone who insists that it's anything more than the C-tier movie it really is.

Desingu Raja 2 is a sorry excuse for a movie, packed with mindless subplots that go absolutely nowhere. The first film was silly but the comedy actually worked - so well, that I could still catch it on TV and have a good time.

But this sequel confuses loud, obnoxious noise for comedy - with zero timing or purpose. I can't think of a single scene that made me even crack a smile. The acting, the songs, and just everything about it was horrible. There was one single reaction in the theater throughout, and it was just silence.

There's hardly anything redeeming here, making it an easy frontrunner for the worst movie of the year.

Atrociously cringe-worthy dialogues, but still a decent movie nonetheless.

Also the fact that it was set in Afghanistan, but every character was speaking in English with an Afghani accent felt silly. Nobody else but English speakers do this... where you make a movie about another country, then cheapen it by anglicizing (think even movies like Gladiator where ancient Romans speak English). Have you ever watched say, a Chinese movie about something happening in Brazil where everyone is supposed to be Brazilian but speak Mandarin? Or a French movie about Japan where all Japanese people speak French? I dunno, I would have preferred the same movie in Arabic to preserve authenticity. This just felt silly, and it's silliness that shouldn't have impacted an otherwise decently inspiring and heartwarming movie!