Akshara

Story : A physics teacher at a corporate educational institution aims to lessen the stress on students who have the pressure of marks and ranks hovering over them. However, the teacher is at loggerheads with an ambitious educationalist who wants his students to secure top ranks at any cost so that he can gain monopoly in corporate education. With two different styles of teaching on display, who will eventually prevail?

Review: Many Tollywood films have the tendency to weave in a message for the audience in their narrative, to justify the lead character's violent acts. The only difference in Akshara is that it's done by a woman. The film, despite the message is conveys, is ridden with cliches with a plotline that can be predicted from a mile away.
Akshara begins by explaining the model of corporate education system, which is cut-throat, exploitative and driven by PR, especially on result days. Akshara (Nandita Swetha) joins a corporate educational institution as a physics teacher with an aim to lessen the burden on the students. However, educationalist Bhargav (Sanjay Swaroop) wants to run a monopoly in corporate education and wants his students to secure top ranks at any cost. What follows is a bitter clash of ideologies and strategies between the two.
If the sermons about the education system wasn't bad enough, the makers try to put in an unnecessary comic track involving Satya, Shakalaka Shankar and Madhunandan, which looks forced and cringe-worthy. The screenplay is poor and one feels clueless about where the film is heading even after one hour of run-time.
The film picks up pace in the second half following a dramatic interval twist. Although there's not anything new on offer, it makes for decent viewing. However, director B Chinni Krishna is found wanting in terms of creating intrigue for the viewers. The plotline looks predictable and the twists seem familiar.
Nandita Swetha gets a full-fledged role and delivers a good performance. She looked sharp on-screen and makes sure she owns the screen. Sanjay Swaroop seemed too smooth to be an antagonist and while he puts in an earnest performance, his image didn't quite live up to role of a ruthless industrialist that the script demanded.
With audiences being exposed to strong digital content on OTT platforms, there is little tolerance for films that have illogical flaws. When a protagonist breaks every possible law to prove a point about the problematic education system, you can't help but wonder if it was worth taking up over two hours of your time.