The Birthday Boy Review

While The Birthday Boy did not create an impact on the general audience, the chronically online, cinema-loving Telugu youth quickly took notice of The Birthday Boy’s quirky promotions, which involved the actors of the film mocking popular YouTube critics like Ragadi and Barbell. The Birthday Boy is directed by Whisky, who has been attending all public events with his face covered. The director, along with his producer Bharath, have reportedly left their full-time jobs in Canada to pursue their passion in filmmaking. The Birthday Boy is poised to be a dark thriller set amidst a group of NRI boys in the USA.

What is it about?

The Birthday Boy is set amidst a group of young NRI students based in the United States who live together in a house. These boys belong to the same town and have known each since childhood. A birthday party in their house turns sideways when the “birthday boy” dies while the boys are giving birthday bumps to him. What happens to these boys, as they try to make sense of their friend’s untimely demise, forms the rest of the story.

Performances

Ravi Krishna, who shot to fame with his work in Virupaksha, plays a key role in the film. He is also one of the most recognizable faces in the Birthday Boy. The rest of the film’s actors, including Rajeev Kanakala, receive poorly written roles that leave them with no option but to deliver performances that are unidimensional, overly melodramatic and unmemorable.

Technicalities

The Birthday Boy belongs to sub-genre of films called chamber dramas. Chamber dramas (or films) are shot in a single location, which could be a room or a house. 90% of The Birthday Boy is shot in a single house. Even though the film is set in the states, the indoor portions look like they have been shot in India itself. Chamber dramas are often made by short film makers or indie filmmakers because it requires very little budget & simple logistics to execute this kind of films.

However when you restrict most of your film to a single location, it is important to have strong dialogues and interpersonal drama to keep the audience invested in your film. That never happens with The Birthday Boy. Not only are the film’s characters so generic in their personalities, the events of the film don’t attract any curiosity from the audience either. Despite of the weak writing, production values looks ok.

Thumbs Up

Ravi Krishna

Mystery elements in the second half

Thumbs Down

Poor Writing

Melodrama in first half

Dragged Scenes

Analysis

The Birthday Boy is merely “new-age” in its appearance and its eagerness to pepper dialogues with expletives, this is otherwise a very old-fashioned film. The story takes forever to take off and when it does, the result feels extremely dissatisfying. The writers of the film seem to mistake escalation of stakes for panchayati-style melodrama in the first half. The second half has an extremely amateurish flashback. It barely makes an impact because we have seen such scenes and sub-plots in countless Telugu films growing up. After the movie ends, the audience is left with plain and bad storytelling.

Bottomline: Weak Birthday Party

Rating: 1.75/5