One-Line Review of Live Telecast: A group of film-makers gets trapped inside a haunted house facing a life or death situation.
YouTube Trailer Live Telecast
Starring: Kajal Aggarwal, Vaibhav, Priyanka Nair, Anandhi
Directed By: Venkat Prabhu
Release Date: 12th February 2021
Introduction
Live Telecast is a Tamil web series directed by Venkat Prabhu starring Kajal Aggarwal in the lead. The plot of the web series resembles a lot of already released movies and shows, a group of people, to be precise, filmmakers get stuck inside a haunted house.
“Kajal Aggarwal’s maiden web series Live Telecast, directed by Venkat Prabhu, gives us a been-there-seen-that feeling throughout. The show lacks punch towards the end.”
~ India Today
My rating for this horror flick by Venkat Prabhu is 6.5/10
Summary
A horror program named ‘Dark Tales’ on a channel called ‘Nam TV’ directed by Jenifer Matthew goes wrong as they end up showing a woman in a bad way, stirring up wide controversy from people. To correct the damage, Jenifer aka Jenny plans to make another show along with her team where the audience will be shown real footage of Ghosts.
The team of film-maker manages to find a secluded haunted house which is currently inhabited by a family consisting of three, a Mother – Shenbagam, and her two children. The family already are experiencing supernatural behaviors and the team of filmmakers is planning to shoot the same life if possible in hopes of capturing the Ghost. Things go wrong when one of the casts of filmmakers die and the rest gets stuck inside the house being hunted by an unseen supernatural force.
Performances
Kajal Aggarwal as Jenifer looks superhot and dashing with a bossy attitude. Venkat Prabhu, as he already mentioned in his interviews, has succeeded in showing a different face of Kajal through his series and she looks pretty convincing. Apart from her, everyone has done justice to their roles. Venkat Prabhu has given space for all the characters in his series to perform and create an impact.
Priyanka Nair as Shenbagam was good onscreen and special applause goes to her son who played the role of Shree who suffers from a condition called prosopagnosia.
Review
The plot indeed looks like it is been penned during the years 2005-2006 as mentioned by the director because almost everything in it looks cliched. Perhaps if Venkat would have released the same script back then, it might have got better reviews than it’s getting now.
The show mocks the absurdness shown in the horror movies in one scene and they adapt to it in another. You expect jump cares and there it comes. You expect the ghost to show up dramatically and there it is. There is nothing unexpected in the series. With timely humor, Venkat has managed to inject some light-hearted moments too at times in the story.
By the climax of the series, when you are expecting something really good to unveil and happen as it is a horror flick, everything just goes flat and ends. Apart from very few interesting elements, Live Telecast has nothing new to offer.
Verdict
Only Kajal’s terrific makeover as a bad-ass girl and her performance is new in this otherwise routine story. The only thing that can make you sit till the climax will be your interest to know the story of the supernatural element in the story.
