Composite films in Tamil cinema have been silently washing the shores since ‘Oru Veedu Iru Vaasal’ days which was directed by ace director Balachander and the most recent was ‘Vaanam’ which was a telugu remake. 'David', directed by Bejoy Nambiar belonged to such a genre that had 2 different scripts of varying intensities that shared a common climax.
The film opens showing both the characters of David (Jiiva & Vikram) at their tipping point with Jiiva pulling out his knife gearing to stab a politician and Vikram on the other end trying to propose to a bride at her wedding. Then slowly we are given a sense of the time zones wherein Jiiva’s story takes place in Mumbai in the year 1999 while Vikram’s was the more contemporary one taking place in Goa in the year 2010. Jiiva is an aspiring guitarist who wants to make it big in life but falters, but when he finds a foothold, fate intervenes and spells havoc in his life. On the other side, Vikram is a drunkard and a loafer who leads a loser's life after his would be dumps him before their wedding and is unlucky with his bridal search. His best friend’s fiance has a soft corner for him and so he falls for her. He tries to woo her through various means without any success and does one last time during his best friend’s wedding. The happenings that unfold thereafter and the consequent climax forms the story of this half-cooked movie.
To put it straight, Jiiva’s portion of the story was interesting with respect to the narrative and had a much stronger intensity than Vikram’s which was weak and boring. Though Vikram managed to put up a brave show as a loafer, he was not able to entertain us even by a whisker. The things that were supposed to be jokes were flat and lifeless. His combination with Saurabh Shukla who acted as his spiritual father was just not working. Above all, Vikram’s part of the story was a dubbed one from Hindi and hence lacked nativity.
On the other hand Jiiva’s portions was shot in Tamil and had credible performances from Jiiva and others in the cast. Nasser as Jiiva’s father added spine to the supporting cast. Lara Dutta in a small role in Jiiva’s portion was neat and fitted the bill of a middle aged widow. Also Rohini Hattangadi as the wicked politician and John Vijay as a crooked goon were there to add the grey shades to the narrative.
In Vikram’s portion, Tabhu was the known face among the supporting cast. Isha Sharwani as Vikram’s friend’s fiance was attractive and did the best for her role. Since the entire portion was not engaging, the performances were the last thing to ponder into.
Editing by Shrikar Prasad was perfect given the nature of the script. He could do very little for making Vikram’s portion better as there was literally no content in it.
Camera by duo Rathnavelu and Vinod was brilliant. Be it the beaches of Goa or the rainy Mumbai, the camera brought in the mood with good lighting techniques and brilliant choice of colors.
Music was by 5 different music directors. Among them, Anirudh’s ‘Kanave’ stood out and grabs us with its sheer rendering prowess by Anirudh himself.
This movie carried a Bollywood watermark and thus the narrative looked weird at times. Heard that there was a third stream of narrative in the Hindi version and that was the most interesting of the lot. Unfortunately the director sidelined that one in the Tamil version and that clearly shows the target audience for this movie.
Rating: For Vikram’s portion - 1/5; For Jiiva’s portion - 3/5; Avg - 2/5
Verdict: Watch only Jiiva’s portion of the story or watch the movie on your TV
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