U Turn Review: A Riveting, Crisp Thriller With Some Predictable Moments

U Turn is one of the most anticipated movies of the year. The movie has a fitting cast – Samantha Akkineni plays the intern reporter Rachana, who works in Times Of India.

Aadi plays Inspector Nayak in a rather serious role. He later helps out Rachana in the case where she tries to find out the mystery behind the suicides.

The plot is about the mysterious deaths that happen related to the traffic violation at a City flyover. Rachana wants to make a killer story out of this series of incidents.

But she didn’t expect to get into the mess herself.

Rachana’s character is built with a lot of strength and depth.

Her dedication and curiosity towards people moving the roadblocks in the flyover to take a U Turn takes us into the actual story.

Once the movie starts it takes a little while to establish the actual story. The first few minutes, say 10-15 minutes are quite dragging.

But once we are in, the movie picks up an interesting pace and we are presented with ample twists and turns, some predictable though.

The horror element does form a crucial part of the story as it makes the message emotionally strong.

Yet, there is not much use to that element – not very horrific, and not very surprising too as the director reveals the suspense quite early.

The runtime of the movie is a big plus. There are no unwanted songs or commercial fights. However we have a bit of romance between Rachana (Samantha) and her colleague Aditya (played by Rahul Ravindran).

Though Rahul doesn’t have much scope to perform, he neatly delivers what his role needs.

Aadi, on the other hand, has enough scope and he performs the emotions of a serious, yet not rude, and understanding police officer.

We have other supporting characters who neatly fit into their roles.

There are a couple of jump scare moments to look out for. Yet, there is no horror otherwise. Just some mystery.

Which is why we would have been a lot contented if the movie had just stuck to the “crime thriller” genre and had not involved the ghost backstory.

In fact the movie takes a U turn once the ghost aspect enters (and that too is quite predictable, and the director also gives you ample clues).

All the anticipation and suspense that were built up in the first half simply starts to lose its grip post interval.

Yet we have a few twits towards the climax too to keep us engaged, but by that time, we lose patience and curiosity in the actual case!

U Turn does try to tell us an important message about violating traffic rules without caring for the others. And such a message is crucial for today’s population.

Even though the movie runs for only 2 hours, we still find it a bit stretched out towards the end.

Perhaps if the pace of the movie had been made a bit faster, we would have felt enough thrill.

Nevertheless, U Turn is indeed an engaging crime thriller with its own jump scare and edge of the seat moments.

Poorna Chandra Tejaswi has crafted pretty engaging music for the movie. Be it for the suspense scenes or for the romantic scenes, his music perfectly fits the mood.

Niketh Bommi’s cinematography does perfect justice to the scenes on screen.

Especially in the scene where two friends attempt to kill each other in police custody room, the lighting works very well to enhance the thrill.

Pawan Kumar has dealt with emotions very carefully.

Rachana’s role is so carefully crafted – right from her outfit to her language and mannerism, working bachelor women can very well relate to her.

Similarly Aadi, as usual, fits into the role of the familiar police officer – strict yet grounded. These two characters add to the strength of the movie.

When you finish watching the movie, terms like U Turn, Road Block and Fly Over will be all over your mind.

If you want a crisp and cool entertainer, go for U Turn. But be warned that you will have some predictable and disappointing moments in the second half!