Niharika Konidela is back with Rakasa, the first directorial project for Manasa Sharma after her successful executive producing role on Committee Kurrollu. Vennela Kishore, Getup Srinu and Tanikella Bharani play supporting roles alongside the film's two lead actors Sangeeth Shobhan and Nayan Sarika, in the upcoming film Rakasa. The film Rakasa has attracted a lot of buzz via its unique marketing strategy which combines both horror and comedy elements in order to generate significant trailer views before its release. Did it deliver?

Storyline

The story takes place in the village of Rakavanam, where there is a very old fort that is said to be inhabited by a Brahmarakshasi demon spirit. The villagers believe that when there are falling meteors, they are obligated to offer human sacrifices to this demon in order to protect the village from it.

Veerababu (Sangeeth Shobhan) comes back from the US and inadvertently gets pulled into one of these rituals and ends up inside the evil fort. While inside, he meets up with Somu (Vennela Kishore), who has been there for an unknown period of time. In order to escape from the demon, Veerababu will have to deal with some very debilitating fears from different sources of chaos and strange happenings along with Subbulakshmi (Nayan Sarika). The rest of the film is about whether these three people will escape the demon.

Positive Points

The film was a good horror-comedy. It had some good laughs, but also had some good suspense moments as well. Sangeeth Shobhan made me laugh as he acted very naturally, while also having good comedic timing! Vennela Kishore was funny too and had so many fun moments throughout the film! The first half was really fun and entertaining with a good mix of comedy and set-up! The village and castle locations were very nice visually as well, while the background music during some parts of the movie helped enhance the fun! Director Manasa Sharma not only told an entertaining story, but also successfully kept the audience entertained, although we had seen that type of premise before.

Negative Points

This film did not do a good job of providing any real scares at all; basically the fear level was non-existent. The storyline felt very predictable and did not offer any unique or innovative aspects. There were some parts of the film (such as the murder subplot) that seemed to be “forced”. There are inconsistencies with logic throughout the movie, such as when multiple characters can escape from a dangerous castle filled with a large number of other people. The inconsistent elements of the movie help make it difficult for the audience to have any faith in the overall film as being believable; because although there were some fun scenes later on in the movie, there wasn't enough opportunity to build up a suspenseful experience with which the audience would be entertained enough (and for a sufficient amount of time) to want to continue watching the movie.

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Verdict: I would classify Rakasa as a pretty mediocre horror / horror-comedy. There are many comedic elements to this film, so if you enjoy comedies even though they may not be funny, you should see this at least once. While there are no new things in the horror genre that weren't previously done, I would still recommend it for any person who enjoys horror comedies.