Live Telecast is an Indian Tamil Horror comedy web series directed by Venkat Prabhu. It stars Kajal Aggarwal, Vaibhav, Kayal Anandhi, Selva, and Priyanka in the main roles. It has a total of 7 episodes and was released on 12th February 2021 on Disney+ Hotstar.
Jennifer Mathew (Kajal Aggarwal) is the director of the horror show Dark Tales. The show is about the real encounters with supernatural stuff but they show all of that with enactments and is booming in the television world. The sponsors are coming and the whole team also had their success party. But everything goes wrong when they tried to show some bold scenes in one of the episodes which their family audience didn't like and protests start to happen to ban the show. Even the show's time slot has now been given to some daily soap. Dark Tales being canceled, Jennifer and her team come up with a plan to catch ghosts live on their cameras and they have a perfect location for that. The channel head is willing to take a chance with this new and intriguing format and permitted them. The team arrives at the location, the house at the Shivkriti Hills, which the locals believe to be haunted. The mother and her daughter and a son share their experiences they have to go through in that house facing the evil. They are not able to leave the house and this makes the perfect opportunity for the team to revive the magic of their show. Is there really a ghost in that house? Will Jennifer and her team be able to save her show? This is what you'll see here.
Venkat Prabhu's script is haphazard from the start itself. Neither his characters nor the media world that he tried to show looks convincing. At a success party, loads of characters introduce themselves and also reveals whom they love. Jennifer is the crush of her show's DOP but sadly that's about it, forget about this couple coz you won't see it in any further episodes. You will not have any idea who they are beyond their workplace.
Saying about the horror elements, it's better not to discuss it as they are unintentionally funny, and you'll not get more than people flying or possessed people in the white lens holding others throats. It has nothing more to show in the horror department apart from these two scenes which keep coming up frequently. The only high point in the show is when they arrive at the haunted house, it's the 4th or 5th episode, and the rest episodes are just 'no thank you'.
Sekar (Vaibhav) is one of the key characters here, and due to its shallow treatment, his backstory hardly affects you. Kajal's character being central offers nothing different neither the whole show. The last 3 episodes have a feel like Money Heist where the ghost is holding the family and crew members hostage and the police are outside waiting for the door to open. The execution is very dull apart from some genuinely funny scenes. And eventually, a time comes, when you become dreadfully tired of seeing people floating with white eyes and making 'gggrrhh gggrrhh' noises and wants this to ends.
It's so sad to see Kajal Aggarwal making her digital debut with this crap. She is unconvincing in every frame, neither her expressions nor her speedy dialogue delivery works. Only Vaibhav, Subha, and Priyanka are good and earnest in their parts and others are just about average.
The cinematography by Rajesh Yadav is terrible. It gives out the vibes like you're watching a daily horror soap like Aahat or Fear Files. It's doesn't have any frame that looks cinematic or even close to how the web series is shot. It degrades the quality even more. The production design is also unreal. The channel office doesn't look like any office, the channel head's cabin and everything is too artificial to look. The original score by Premgi Amaren is good though and the editing by Venkat Rajeen is just about okay.
Live Telecast is a show which I wouldn't dare to watch even if it was telecast live on any big channel. Written in 2005, the story has lost its originality, and now watching it, everything looks cliched. The funny thing is Jennifer says in one scene 'I feel it's too much of a cliché' referring to the part where they will go to capture a ghost in a haunted house. It would have been great if it would have tried to answer did really ghost exist? It's hard, but to some extent, they could have tried. But no, what you get here is the same old overused plot and the simplified screenplay is a real mess here. There are many other Hollywood movies out there like '13 Cameras' or 'Await Further Instructions', watch that instead, at least that will keep you hooked to the end.
Rating:- 1/5
Now streaming on Disney+ Hotstar.
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