Flying, rolling (in the air) automobiles? This has it spades, if that kind of thing is your ... thing. Loud, melodramatic leads? Yup, right up there... Songs when there is no need , feeding our common navel-gazing frenzy? Yup. Comedy that works ? Surprisingly, in spades too (and that's what kinda elevates this one over others of its ilk, of which there have been quite a few, and will be many more, judging by the way the audiences are lapping it up). Cases in point - the entire initial 'Inside' track and 'Kill Bill' Pandey.
A good Allu Arjun performance? Standard-order, since he seems to be quite sincere in almost everything that he does.
Also, for the first time, plastic-surgery seems to suit someone.
The bad? Time for the brickbats, since most audiences are too forgiving about everything bad in movies like this.
Let me get the typical ones out of the way. Loud acting, loud clothes, loud situations, loud sets, loud everything - check. An almost unimaginable level of suspension of disbelief - check. Situations and lines that want one to scream 'BS' every time - check. Comedy that's crass, and doesn't work for you, but has your immediate neighbor in splits - double check. Bad, extremely bad CGI, that's being passed off as great CGI since AP is the hub of all things software - triple check. Gory, violent, yet cartoony sequences that keep going on (and on, and on....and, you get my drift) even after you've yawned and yawned and yawned - quadruple check (that's actually true).
Moving on to an atypical grouse - Watching movies like 'Cuckoo' reinforces the perplexing nature of wrong lip-sync in most mainstream Indian movies, esp. those from AP and TN (admittedly, to a relatively lesser extent). All the main characters whose native language is not Telugu lip-sync their lines so badly (not their fault, they're doing it in another language), and I don't know how it is for the rest of us, but it never fails to take me out of the movie every-friggin-time. I want to buy-in to what's going on on screen, but fail whenever I see no lip-sync. Our mainstream audiences are really, really forgiving of their multi-crore offerings, and maybe, just maybe, that's not such a bad thing?
I'd advise you to watch it at the local big screen, but do these guys deserve your money? I'd say no, but you'll not bother. Maybe.
