Cast: Varun Tej, Meenakshi Chaudhary, Nora Fatehi, Saloni, "Satyam" Rajesh, Kishore, John Vijay, Ajay Ghosh, Naveen Chandra, P. Ravi Shankar 

Crew: 
Based on life of Ratan Khetri
Cinematography by A. Kishor Kumar
Editing by Karthika Srinivas
Music by G. V. Prakash Kumar
Written & Directed by Karuna Kumar
Produced by Vijender Reddy Teegala, Rajani Talluri

Varun Tej has been one of those star actors from Telugu Cinema with a penchant to prove his acting skills. He wants to try something with his each and every film rather than sticking to one sort of an image. His last three solo releases have been completely underwhelming and the actor has been trying some intense characters lately. Now, he took on a gangster flick, Matka. The highly skilled writer-director and Palasa 1978 fame Karuna Kumar joined hands with Varun for this flick. The teaser and trailer have gone viral and raised curiosity about the film. Let's discuss about the movie in detail. 

Plot: 

Vasu(Varun Tej) arrives to Vizag shores with his mother. He tries to find a job for himself but struggles hard. In Poorna Market, he finds a coconut retailer Appala Reddy(Ajay Ghosh) and asks him for work. In offering work to him, Appala Reddy encounters trouble with local gangster KB(John Vijay)'s right hand man Ammoru. Vasu saves Appala Reddy after making a deal with for partnership in his business. KB and Ammoru use police to tackle Vasu and when they decide to kill him, Nani Babu(Kishore), another powerful gangster, saves him. 

Nani Babu runs clubs and has plans to become a politician. He asks Vasu be help him in his mission. Vasu quickly starts to become his most trusted person and starts branded clothes business. Vasu marries Sujatha(Meenakshi Chaudhary) and decides to expand clothing business by constructing mills. But the terms of investment doesn't sync with his plans and he decides to start a new gambling business, Matka. What happens thereafter? Watch the movie to know more. 

Analysis :

Matka starts off well with trying to establish the character of Vasu. But then it treads into cliched zone from the moment Vasu meets Appala Reddy. Even though we see the painstaking efforts have gone into construction of sets, recreation of 60's Vizag, nothing really leaves an impact on us. The story telling follows age old rags to riches template without trying for any sort of invention and innovation in narrative. Even if you don't know the beats of a regular gangster flick, it is easy to predict the next scene. Director Karuna Kumar has written such a lacklustre screenplay that nothing really carries us into the story. 

Varun Tej has delivered his career best performance in terms of body language, dialogue delivery and looks. He gave his best to each and every scene. While we can see his effort and his sincerity on screen, he could not really save the sinking boat with his performance. He stayed true to his character and showcased great ease at every given point but the writing has let him down, big time. 

Vasu character needed to grow on us to such a level that we admire his guts just like Rocky in KGF and Pushpa in Pushpa. While the film seems to have inspired by them to tell an anti-hero's story, the film doesn't excite us like "Once Upon a Time in Mumbai". The Hindi film based on such underground Mafia could bring excitement to 80's style narrative with screenplay engaging us throughout. 

In Matka, the director falters in connecting us with Vasu and his struggles emotionally. It feels like he tried to follow established cliches so religiously that he did not care about being predictable. Even an age-old, regular story can be re-invented and re-told in an exciting new way but trying to follow the trend and make your story in a certain way does harm our narrative. Even with good background score by GV Prakash Kumar and a good performance by Varun Tej, still Matka fails in providing a good theatrical experience. 

TeluguOne Perspective :

Matka ends up being an uninteresting and disengaging predictable gangster flick.