Paul Nicodemus, TNN, Mar 10, 2023, 02.37 PM ISTCritic's Rating: 2.5Story: Sanatan (Aadi SaiKumar) is a crime scene investigator known for his genius crime-solving abilities. When a famous businessman Vikram Chakravarthi (Tarak Ponnappa), is brutally murdered, the police department appoints Sanatan to investigate the mystery. What did he uncover during the process, and did he solve the mystery?
Review: The crime thriller genre in Telugu cinema has been gaining popularity recently, and it’s a welcome change. CSI Sanatan falls in this category and is a decent murder mystery. There is enough oomph in its story and narration to make it tick the boxes in this genre, but could this film have been better? The answer is yes. For example, the film tries to spoon-feed the audience about how an investigation is done, which might come across as over-explanation. Also, it had continuity issues at places. Plenty of action occurs whenever our investigator plays saviour and gets into fistfights. However, using the available police force as a backup would make it more organic. On the positive side, though, the makers have done a brilliant job in making the film look, feel and sound like a good crime thriller with its intense visuals and intriguing background score. And the actors have done an impressive job of making it work.
Aadi SaiKumar, as Sanatan, does a commendable job playing an intense investigator and draws the audience’s attention. For that matter, even other characters in the movie do justice to their roles. Ali Reza, as inspector Rudra, gets an important role, and he delivers. Tarak Ponnappa as Vikram Chakravarthi, Nandini Rai as Divya and Madhusudhan as Raja Vardhan look formidable as a crony businessman, opportunist seducer and greedy politician, respectively. However, the character played by Misha Narang as Sudeeksha, the love interest of Sanatan and also one of the suspects in the mystery, should have been better written. The love angle doesn’t have an emotional connection and significance in the grand scheme of things. The song between Sanatan and Sudeeksha in the second half only breaks the movie’s flow rather than aiding it. Supporting actors include Vasanthi, Sanjay Reddy, Khayyum Ali, Siva Karthik and Ravi Prakash.
Written and directed by Sivashankar Dev, the film had a screenplay by Chaganti Santaiah and Sivashankar Dev, music by Aneesh Solomon, cinematography by Ganganamoni Shekar, editing by Amar Reddy, art direction by Ravikumar Gurram and fights by U Pruthvi.
The crime thriller is a decent watch with enough mystery to get the audience hooked. Better writing and eliminating some of the cliches could have made it even better. The film ends on a promising note with a hint of a sequel.