Story: Sebastian is a police constable suffering from night blindness. When a murder takes place on his watch, how will he solve the crime?
Review: The trailer of Sebastian PC 524 promised something exciting. We’re told there’s a protagonist with a predicament, a murder mystery he must solve, basically the story of an underdog who must rise above his pitfalls. And after SR Kalyanamandapam, when movie buffs saw that Kiran Abbavaram chose a script that’s part thriller, it definitely ups expectations. But the film manages to meet none of them.
The film begins by introducing us to numerous characters as if every single one of them has a great bearing on the story. But as soon as Sebastian (Kiran Abbavaram) is brought into the fray, every single scene revolves around him and the story takes a back seat. He suffers from night blindness; his mother wants to keep it a secret. Director Sayyapu Reddy tries to use this issue for laughs but the joke feels overlong.
Soon a love track is forcibly brought into the fold and the songs test your patience. The film only gets into the thick of things when the murder takes place. Seba’s choice of keeping his disability a secret leads to the murder of a woman in town and he’s suspended. The makers finally give a reason for you to stay invested and wonder what happens next.
After watching the first half of Sebastian PC 524 no one expects the film to be an edge-of-the-seat thriller, but at least some decent storytelling is expected. But the muddled screenplay filled with unnecessary turns is a massive let-down. In an era where global cop dramas are at your fingertips, Sebastian seems like a sick joke. The way he ‘investigates’ the mystery and manages to solve it also hardly passes muster.
The film also manages to forget the ‘sincere’ love track it wasted time on in the first half. The mother sentiment fails to work due to bad placement in the scheme of things and writing. The climax feels rushed, giving an unsatisfactory ending to a tepid murder case. The background score by Ghibran is not enough to help Sebastian PC 524 stay afloat.
Kiran Abbavaram’s slang as a boy from Madanapalli might spill laughs but it’s not enough to help him shine. He pulls off his role well but what’s the point when he lands himself such scripts? Both Nuveksha and Komalee Prasad are barely on screen and don’t get to do much. All other actors fare well.
The story of Sebastian PC 524 has scope for so much more but the makers seem to hardly try. Even the short duration of the film feels long – and that says it all.
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