Kannada actor Dhruva Sarja, or the ‘Action Prince’ as his fans in Karnataka popularly call him, is returning to the big screen with Martin. Dhruv is one of the few actors who has carved an undisputed place for himself among the most followed stars of Kannada cinema, even though he has had only four films released before. Despite being in the film industry for over a decade, his fans have had to wait very patiently every time to see their favorite star on the big screen. Will Martin prove to be worth the fans’ wait? Let’s find out!

Martin was projected to be a high-octane action entertainer, with action set pieces that promised to be never seen before in Indian cinema. The film follows the adventures of Martin and his enemy Arjun, an IRS officer, as they fight against each other in Pakistan. what happens next? Who is Martin? Who is Arjun? Where are they from? These are some of the questions that the makers clearly throw in front of the audience from the very beginning and their answers form the core of the film.

Dhruv Sarja, who plays the lead character, ensures that all these questions are posed to the audience within the first 20 minutes of the film. A familiar character trait in all of Dhruv’s films has been the forceful nature of his character, which is not limited to just the dialogues. In this film we can see him in ‘full volume’ as he plays two characters – the strict IRS officer Arjun and the mad villain Martin. While it must be admitted that Dhruv’s screen presence is what has earned him a fan following, even that couldn’t save this film, which is so poorly executed. Apart from Dhruv, there is neither scope nor screen-time for any other actor to make an impact.

Here is the trailer:

To think that veteran actor-director Arjun Sarja would come up with such a paper-thin plot and create a story with unnecessarily complex proceedings that make no sense from a bird’s eye view is really disappointing.

AP Arjun, who also directed Dhruv’s debut film, Adhuri, is known for making films full of romance and family drama. With Martin, it became very clear that he bit off more than he could chew. The film which was supposed to be a stylish action flick looked a complete disaster on screen. It becomes an added responsibility for directors to have a strong grip on all the technical departments, especially with big budget action films like this, as it doesn’t take long for this responsibility to become a burden. And that appears to be the case with director Martin in this instance. From directing to VFX, CGI, editing and all the other technical departments, every aspect of Martin was massively disappointing.

Neither composer Mani Sharma’s songs nor Ravi Basrur’s BGM made any impact in the film. These songs seemed like imitations of popular songs like Dilbar from Satyamev Jayate and OMG Daddy from Allu Arjun’s Ala Vaikunthapurramuloo. Ravi Basrur, who rose to fame with his work in the KGF series and Salaar, could not present the same magic for Martin, as his music was more base but less abstract.

Martin could have been a generic action thriller with a template story, had it not been saddled with such a high budget and unnecessary nonsense. Something that the audience can enjoy watching while in a festive mood.

With Dhruv’s KD, which is directed by Prem and also stars Sanjay Dutt, Shilpa Shetty, Ravichandran, Ramesh Aravind and others, and scheduled to release in late December this year, we can only hope that Dhruv Save yourself and let Martin be forgiven and forgotten. ,

2 out of 5 stars for Martin.