Thank you!

Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry's standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown ...

Minimal Design

Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry's standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown ...

Download high quality wordpress themes at top-wordpress.net

Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry's standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown ...

Easy to use theme admin panel

Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry's standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown ...

Prev Next

Archive for 2014

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , , , , , ,


Kaaviya Thalaivan (Epic Hero) - A ‘perceived’ rivalry drama from a forgotten era!




Director Vasanthabalan has a conservative yet a dare devilish streak in his knack of storytelling, which would certainly place him among the frontline filmmakers of today. One common thing in all his movies is that a character would have an underpinned suffering which is unknown to the character but would appear as a deja vu for the audience. He would allow the audience to share the grief and sufferings of that character and at the end when the audience expect a traditional way of relieving themselves in return for the time they have invested, he wouldn’t hesitate to throw a spanner by just declaring that there is just a continuum of suffering from which one cannot get liberated as long as one stays in the theater. At times he tends to draw parallels with director Bala (whose work, needless to say is reminiscent of cumulative suffering, in almost all instances). The point of deviation between the two directors is that, Vasanthabalan takes a rather conservative route of employing some intriguingly lighter moments, some genuine gags that tickles and restores balance in the narrative unlike his senior who is much more stiff and hardly cares for any of these.


Kaaviya Thalaivan also seems to follow the above mentioned narrative structure but was carried out with much poise. The story is set in a suburb of Madurai of pre-independent India where drama troupes were regarded as the messiahs of entertainment. The story is spun around Komathi (Prithviraj) and Kali (Siddharth), artistes who perform on stage for a drama company under the aegis of their guru, Sivadas (Nassar). Komathi gradually develops a rivalry with Kali as the latter is lauded for his dedication and performance by their guru and tries hard to pull him down. This battle continues throughout the movie where Kali remains the blue-eyed boy with respect to the script, which I wish could have taken some interesting twists, but sadly had none.


The narrative was engaging for a finite interval, after which we tend to predict things and what would ensue by simply putting together the proceedings. The ending also seemed to add an unnecessary element of flab as it was easily guessable. But what worked - the performances from Prithviraj, Siddharth, Vedhika; the brilliant tunes from Rehman which were made to come alive on screen with some equally vibrant cinematography by Nirav Shah; and finally the mise en scene that was put in place to pull off the period in which the story was narrated - kudos for the art department, though most of them had a ‘Chettinad’ fervor.


Off the lot, Prithviraj’s characterization, even though sketched on predictable lines, with deep shades of grey, made us empathize with him at times due to Siddharth’s shoddy character sketch of that of a ‘playboy with principles’ that was too sweet to swallow. How does Siddharth manage to lure the women on screen? Why does Prithviraj lose track in the middle? Had these uncertainties been attended with much more tangible rationales, this would have been an epic in its truest sense. For now it just aspires to be one and is almost there - so near yet so far!!


Verdict: Worth a Watch


Rating: 2.5 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , , , , , , , , ,


Interstellar - Space Cowboys Warped in Time!



Spoilers everywhere!!

Wormhole, black hole, relativity, neutron stars, singularity, zero gravity, three dimensional space in a five dimensional world - these are some of the jargons and weird scientific terms that one would come across while watching Christopher Nolan’s ‘Interstellar’, the latest sci-fi adventure to wash Hollywood’s shores. The hype was ripe and the expectations were sky high not only because of its mammoth budget but also thanks to the director’s belligerent record of reinventing the non-linear narrative style time and again. Has ‘Interstellar’ transcended the threshold of the rhetoric filmmaking of the run-of-the-mill sci-fi flicks? The answer if of course a resounding yes. And how did it go about doing the same?

The story is set in a not so distant future, where the entire world is reduced to an agrarian economy. People find it hard to thrive in the disintegrating planet that is marred with dust storms and blight. Cooper (Matthew McConaughey), a former NASA test pilot turned farmer lives with his family and is surviving the blight. His daughter Murph (Jessica Chastain) often brings to his notice that a ‘ghost’ is communicating with her through Morse code, which Cooper fails to believe. One stormy day Cooper and Murph are being hinted with the help of a Morse code (by the supposed ‘ghost’) of a coordinate that would lead them to a secret facility. They reach there and find out that the secret facility is in fact NASA, which is being forced to be in secrecy due to a fund crunch. Professor Brands (Michael Caine in a tailored role) approaches Cooper to steward a mission to find a new planet for sustenance of the human race that is out of our galaxy. Cooper decides to go on with the mission against his daughter’s wish and what ensued was something not every common viewer can comprehend. The inter-galactic travel, the concept of time getting dilated when there is a heavy gravitational pull and an hour spent on a particular planet consuming seven years on earth are some of the things that need meticulous introspection and thought not only for the filmmaker but also for the viewer.

The audio-visual experience with which a concept as mammoth and equally vague as this has been narrated was literally out of this world. An aura that gets created through exquisitely cinematographed sequences (thank you Hoyte van Hoytema) and brilliantly orchestrated background score (take a bow Hans Zimmer) was something that has to be experienced in theaters. The portions where the spacecraft enters the wormhole, lands on a planet where the ocean is just one foot deep but has skyscraper like waves, the sequence that involves Cooper being thrown into the black hole and so many small but granular scenes were made with panache and sensibility. Definitely Nolan has taken a giant leap with this brilliant piece of filmmaking that would have demanded every nerve of his to ache for a very long time.

The performances were equally good too. Of course Matthew Mcconaughey continues his brilliant form and was fierce in his role. The other noteworthy mentions would be Jessica Chastain as Mathew’s aged daughter and Michael Caine as the Professor. Anne Hathaway with her tastelessly made up hair was just there to balance the equation. Matt Damon was there just to carry that extended cameo role and it could have been anyone’s role for that matter.

Even though the concepts of space and time were heavily researched to stay as close to the reality as possible instead of depicting them as a form of cinematic blasphemy and even though a character in the movie explains the journey through a wormhole with a lame representation on a piece of paper, just think of the plight of an average viewer who has to undergo the agony of going through his/her high school physics text book before watching this movie. These high-fi concepts were sort of an overkill. In other words, the average viewer doesn’t really care about all these intricacies in the script but would no doubt be awestruck with the experience (if he watches this movie in theaters, especially in an IMAX equipped one).

There were so many unanswered questions too even after the movie is over (or to put it simply, the portions which leaves me scratching my head even now) - what’s the age of Cooper when he falls into the blackhole and how long does he communicate with his daughter through Morse Code? How is he getting saved from there and for how long has he been asleep and why did he not age during his sleep and so many more. Please leave your comments if you have any clue.

For me it was purely a sublime experience to watch a movie of such a brilliant stature. Director’s vision counts here and wins hands down beating any ambiguities whatsoever. Just sit back, relax and immerse yourself into this rare cinematic experience. Dont forget to embrace those emotional but philosophical moments that are interwoven so very subtly into the script that one cannot separate that from the high science which the film boasts about. In fact the emotional thread in the script is its epicenter rather than all the scientific musings put together and still that is one way at looking at enjoying this brilliant piece of space odyssey!!
 

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , , ,


Poojai (Worship) - Pray for Patience!




Though it’s been more than a week since I watched this movie, whenever I sat down to write a review, I felt strangely depressing as though I might be restating the obvious. But finally, here I am with the review (more of a lazy rant) that aims to bring out some kind of a warning to refrain from this one as it not only tests our patience, but also our sense of rationale.


If you’ve seen Hari’s previous movies, then there is hardly anything that you would be missing in here - be it for the rapidly (and abruptly) edited scenes, the pre-programmed rampage with a song-fight-comedy-fight-song screenplay sequence (Hari, the program manager), a joint family that commands dignity and respect, a dumb heroine, mother sentiment, tastelessly choreographed songs in eye-catching locales and a frowny faced big mouthed villain who is destined to be crushed by our hero (or in a Hari film’s context, the super-hero). Everything seemed like a lift-off from many of his previous films which was tiring for the senses at large.


The villain acted hysteric and comedy scenes were the least sort after morale boosters that hardly made any sense in the movie’s context. And why Radhika and Sathyaraj were among the fray? Vishal looked stale while Shruti was pale and altogether it was a sorry tale.


Director Hari seems to be quite focused with the kind of stories that he wants to narrate with his own ‘touch and style’ that just doesn't ring well with the critics (but who cares!?). Nevertheless, he always reminds me of that apathetic roadside vendor who sneers at us when we bargain a little for a fair price, with a look that conveys the message straight and blunt, ‘take it or leave it’!!


Verdict: Refrain!

Rating: 1 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , ,


Kathi (Knife) - Double Edged!



Among the two Diwali releases, obviously ‘Kathi’ took the cake along with the cherry when it came to a grand opening, fetching maximum screens for a thunderous release, largely thanks to the successful combo of Vijay and director A.R. Murugadoss. The opening day reports about the movie was good and so decided to watch it (of course, with a grain of salt).

‘Kathi’ alias Kathiresan (Vijay) is a petty criminal who escapes from Kolkata prison and lands in Chennai. He accidentally meets his double, Jeevanantham (Vijay no. 2), who is being targeted by the goons and saves him. Soon Kathiresan switch places with Jeevanantham in order to escape prison term by fleeing from the country. Kathiresan then realizes the do-gooder in Jeevanantham and a social angle in the story kicks in, obviously turning ‘Kathi’ into a super-hero who takes down the evil force all by himself on behalf of Jeevanantham.

To put it straight - I felt really let down with a carelessly written script with an equal dose of weakly developed characters, mainly Neil Nitin Mukesh as the villain, who had ‘Amul Baby’ written all over his face and so his fate gets revealed as soon as he gets introduced. Obviously Vijay movies would be made to stick to a formula, but the success heavily rests on making the entire thing look non-formulaic. That was the missing piece here.

The main problem was the trope of employing a double role for Vijay. I am still clueless about it. One thing that came to my mind was that the backstory was revealed in parts through Kathi (Vijay no.1) with whom we travel throughout the movie. Apart from that there was a subtle character difference which was also not leveraged fully. So why take all the trouble to cast Vijay in a dual role? Also the evil plans of the villain seemed to be too easily unraveled by Kathi, and that even defies the run-of-the-mill ‘formula’ by any yardstick.

Coming back to the social angle - this time the flavour was saving agriculture and promotion of farming. Also a lot of corporate and media bashing were there. But the extent to which the problems were blown out of proportion and the ease with which everything fell in place for the protagonist was least convincing.

Also Samantha was there for some songs and a naive romance. Her role also ended with a what-would-be called an 80s heroine’s role where she is supposed to wait until the hero is released out of jail, no matter how long it takes.

Songs were ok; ‘selfie-pulla’ was double ok. Anirudh’s BGM added some meat and punch during the high-octane show-down scenes between Vijay and Neil Nithin Mukesh.

Overall, the movie is targeted at Vijay fans who would lap up every frame where their star gets to deliver in his own capacity with least botheration towards any logic. How I wish for Vijay to deliver yet another ‘Gilli’ or a ‘Thuppaki’ - I’m waiting!

Verdict: Average

Rating: 2 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , , , ,


Yaan (Me) - What a Yawn!!



Let me start with a disclaimer - there is absolutely no harm in cinematographers directing movies. KV Anand for one is a good contemporary example who has tasted commercial success with movies like ‘Ayan’ and ‘Ko’. Cinematographer Ravi K. Chandran who has been the golden eye behind many successful commercial ventures, has donned his maiden directorial hat with ‘Yaan’. This movie is also a classic example for that which has all the ingredients for a grand product would end in a grand fiasco if the writing and execution is well below par!

Yaan is the story of a happy-go-lucky guy, Chandru (Jiiva), who falls for Sreela (Thulasi), gets trashed by Sreela’s father (Nasser) for being jobless and so pursues for a job overseas through an agent. There he gets caught for carrying drugs and that is thanks to the cunning agent and has to fight his way back to his homeland. Well, then to add some more action masala, we have an Indian terrorist in a foreign land who is waiting to get exposed by our hero (of course our hero does it single handedly). The drag continues until the director himself puts an end to it with an aide of an end card - I was seriously able to feel the director’s shaky vision, especially during the second half where nothing seemed to move in the right direction!!

The production value of the movie was high, actors were good enough, cinematography was awesome, special effects were sufficient - but everything got nullified with a very bad execution. We’ve seen so many such stories in the past - another recent example would be ‘Mariyaan’, which once again was a failure due to a dragging screenplay (even though it had a star on-screen and off-screen - don't ask me who they are?). Except, ‘Aathangara Orathil unnale’, other songs were trademark Harris Jayaraj tunes which had very little creative value. At the end of the day, only ‘Gana’ Bala seems to be the person whom one should trust in order to dish out some whippy lyrics and to keep things afloat. Such was the sad state of affairs!!

Verdict: Strictly Refrain From It!

Rating: 1 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , , ,


Jeeva - Cricket Politics!



In India, even something that is remotely related to the game of cricket has the potential to stoke some frenzy, thanks to the cricket crazy public who literally worship cricketers as their demi-gods. Films and media at large have always played a good part in stoking this frenzy in order to garner ample mileage. The film ‘Lagaan’, which got released more than a decade back was India’s official entry into the oscars, carried the cricket frenzy with itself throughout. Afterall the soul of the movie was good-over-evil, but cricket was a great choice to aide the cause in this case and it worked wonders at the box office too. Besides all these hype and hoopla about the game, there lies beneath a rather shady and quite disgusting politics that often gets overlooked by the public. Even though the game has evolved from leaps and bounds over the years, the politics in cricket (read it as Tamil Nadu cricket association) exists even today and a single ‘community’ believes in thrusting their stranglehold in player selection for the Ranji as depicted in this film.

Jeeva (Vishnu Vishal), a natural cricketing talent, rises up his ranks from being a street cricketer to an ace, playing for his club. When he gets selected for Ranji, ‘caste’ politics in cricket plays spoil sport, thus victimizing him and his friend. Also the story depicts the adverse effects that cricket or rather ‘cricket politics’ has on his personal life, be it losing his friend or love interest. Nevertheless the film ends on a positive note, reiterating the fact that one would be rewarded for sheer focus, perseverance and hard work.

Though the movie tried to portray a realistic picture of the petty politics in cricket, the parallel love story came across rather nonchalantly and was simply no match to Suseenthiran’s portrayal of love in his previous movies like ‘Aadhalaal Kaadhal Seiveer’. There was not a single strong link to vouch for the lead pair to get united at the end. But another story that got unfolded simultaneously which was Vishnu’s ‘guardian family’ with actor Charlie playing a lovely supporting cast was something refreshing. Soori's brief but sharp comic lines were some sort of a stress buster. Also at the end, the much criticized IPL, that is marred by controversies is shown to bail out the protagonist, which by itself was a sweet paradox!

The weakest links in the movie were the pathetically dished out and naively choreographed songs and the predictability in the screenplay. However the movie can be watched for the sheer audacity of the director to depict a sensitive but disgusting issue that has over the years have grown to an extent such that it is classified as a norm. But otherwise, considering the director’s previous attempts, this one would rank much below in terms of narrative engagement.

Verdict: Watchable, but not a must watch!

Rating: 2 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , , , , ,


Madras - Politics Behind the Wall!




The movie opens with a blunt narrative of the rivalry between two petty political groups in North Madras. Immediately the narrative style grabbed the attention with ease and poise, because the bone of contention here is not about money or power (though it is indirectly), but it is because of a wall! Yes you read it correctly - “Wall” it is!!


Pa.Ranjith who made a decent debut with ‘Attakathi’, a soft romantic story based on the outskirt dwellers of Chennai, has come up with a dashing story of the little known politics that is perennial throughout North Madras. The story revolves around two political groups vying for power and in the ensuing battle, their underlings get butchered. Violence, power, politics, friendship, love and betrayal were the flavors used to spice the narrative, which was one of the most engaging in recent times.


Though ‘Pudhupettai’ took the initial plunge to depict the life as-is in the mean streets of North Madras, there, it was all about the goons and their escapades. Here we not only get a glimpse of the goons but also we get so close to the everyday lives of people who are in the lower middle strata, who have families with a breadwinner working in an IT firm, who live in housing units that hardly calls for a lofty living and with little aspirations. It is about a mother who constantly but emotionally banters her son with her line of ‘thavamirinthu pethen da unna’ (I gave birth to you through intense penance), a housewife who knows what her husband does is wrong but hardly has a say about it, a yester-year gangster who is reduced to an eccentric clown and so many others whose characterizations were pretty intriguing and who would not be even known to the upper or middle-class society even in other parts of Chennai (south, west and east). Their slang, body language and dialect made it look typical and sounded so ‘Madras’.


Karthi was at his best - be it in the emotional or action scenes, he had that boy-next-door looks to his advantage. At last, he seems to have recovered from his terrible rough patch. Catherine Tresa looked really odd amongst the crowd - she was like a doll and had the charms, but to survive the characterization in this milieu she might have required an entirely different feature set. The supporting cast were too good - first it’s Aathi, who had appeared in brief roles in many movies, has got a beefy role and has utilized it perfectly. Then the actor who was cast as ‘Johny’, the yesteryear goon, was a revelation. Then the goons who were carefully handpicked for their respective roles were just about fine.


Music by Santosh Narayanan and cinematography by Murali were the other major highlights of the movie. The raw feel of the narrow dwellings and the authenticity surrounding them (there was an electrical mosquito repellent bat at the background during one of the house shots) were too good for the detailing and thus helped elevate the narrative to the next level.


Though the story was predictable in the latter half and a wee bit longer, I cannot help but pass my hearty congrats to director Pa.Ranjith for dissecting the ‘North Madras’ ethos without making any compromises and laying it barely in front of our eyes even if it demands some blood and gore to be splashed on screen more often than not!!


Verdict: Very Good!

Rating: 3.5 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , , , , , , ,


Aranmanai (Palace) - ‘Chandramukhi’ Part 2



Director Sundar C would always carry a minimum guarantee tag along with him and that has worked out wonders in the past as it would readily give him an excellent opening with a “wholesome family entertainer” label. Basically he has made his impressions with sitcoms with many sensational comedians at various point in time. Here comes a comedy horror film from his stable that hosts an ensemble cast which has become a regular phenomenon in most of his recent films.

The story revolves around a palace that is possessed with a girl’s spirit. Obviously the spirit has a reason for it’s vengeance. The family members in the palace are being harassed by the spirit and the obvious reason which is anybody’s guess gets revealed during the climax. The irrational proceedings like the spell against the demons, god-men being flown over to get rid of the spirit, the powerful ‘pooja', etc. towards the climax were scarier than the ghostly deeds as it has pushed back movie making by a decade.

Riddled with cliches that is usually associated with a horror movie, the only thing that made the movie tick was director Sundar’s packaging laced with a great sense of situational humor. The ensemble cast and the supporting cast were perfectly tuned to their strengths, made to slip in their roles and were pitched in with an excellently programmed screenplay that gave rise to an engaging narrative. Thus the cliches got masqueraded in the process and the humor quotient thrived big time.

Among the cast, Santhaanam after a brief hiatus lead the fray, followed by Manobala (whose episode just gave me tears and made my tummy ache out of laughter), Swaminathan and ‘Kovai’ Sarala, in that order. The leads were just used to support the storyline - but the voice over of Andrea and Vinay (who has dubbed on his own) questions the nativity of the dialogs. Even Lakshmi Rai’s voice over sounded much better. Hansika, this time as the demon appeared in a brief cameo during the flashback and has done her usual bubbly stuff with an awry lip sync. Sundar C as the ‘pathfinder’ did a good job and anchored the cast.

Apart from the cliches in the screenplay, the movie drew a lot of parallels to ‘Chandramukhi’. Right from the story being set in a palace, the heroine getting possessed by the ghost, Sundar C being the pathfinder (an equivalent of Rajni - he even wears a specs like Rajni) and even Santhaanam's comedy (an equivalent of Vadivelu’s)  - everything looked so familiar. But as long as a film entertains and audience burst out laughing, these things hardly matter; at least that seems to be the current mantra in Kollywood!!

Verdict: Above Average Laugh Riot!

Rating: 2.5 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , ,


Sigaram Thodu (Touch the Peak) - Run of the mill crime thriller!



Vikram Prabhu seems to be having his agenda clear after his debut in ‘Kumki’. His outings post Kumki have been well attempted edge of the seat thrillers that offer a minimum guarantee and some thrills as bonus. Debutant director Gaurav seems to have done just that with an attempted edge of the seat thriller that was almost racy enough to be called somewhat engaging!

Muralipandian (Vikram Prabhu) aspires to be a bank manager as opposed to his father’s (Sathiyaraj) interest to make him join the police force. He pretends to undergo stringent training, but pursues his interest in the bank job. On the other hand, the city is marred with ATM robbery, wherein the ATMs are looted with a new technique that has the bank authorities and the cops scratching their heads. Murali then gets selected for police training, becomes a cop (even though he doesn’t like the job) and handles the criminals with his brains and brawn!

If the strongest areas in the screenplay were the ATM robbery and subsequent investigation, the weakest links were the father-son relationship and the romantic interludes with a run-of-the-mill north Indian heroine who does a decent job at lip syncing (and lip-locking as well). Vikram Prabhu really had nothing new to offer in his role as it was a replica of the role that he did in his last outing in ‘Arima Nambi’ except now that he was able to flaunt around with a ‘khakhi’ uniform in a cop’s role. Sathiyaraj as a doting father and a yesteryear tough cop was apt for the role. Sathish, who is the latest replacement for Santhaanam as the hero's sidekick does his best to make us laugh, but he just manages to adhere with the proceedings as the situations and the comedy looks too familiar. Director Gaurav himself dons the role of an ‘intelligent’ criminal and it has worked out to an extent.

Music by Imman was forgettable and there was not a single number that was worthy enough to hum or to even remember.

The movie could have been worked out on a much more engaging scale had they plugged the logical loopholes in the script that pops up every now and again. This film desperately tries to keep up with the pace that it tries to create from the start till the end, but falters time and again due to commercial compromises like unwanted duets and sentiments. Less said the better!!

Verdict: Average

Rating: 2 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , ,


Amarakaaviyam (Immortal Epic) - As old as the hills!




When dark humor and crime thrillers seem to be the current flavor of Kollywood, here comes a love story that was touted to be classy and poetical. Director Jeeva Shankar seems to have been in love with this script for a long time which one can make out in the way he narrates each and every frame with a gentle pace and equal poise. But has the pace and poise helped him in the cause of making it a classy one, if not poetical?


The movie opens with the protagonist Jeeva (Sathya) being taken to the court for trial. Mystery surrounds on how he ended up in prison. Soon his flashback unwinds with a slow and meticulously constructed romantic tale with his classmate Karthika (Mia George). Of course, this being a classic love story, the love birds face stiff opposition from their parents. Did they unite at the end or does their possessiveness gets the better of them remains as the bone of contention.


The story is set in the late 80s - an apt time for such a story to stamp its authenticity. With minimal gadgets to interfere, the narrative had the ability to sneak through forgotten trails of the past like communicating through postcards, desperately waiting for the landline to ring, more human interaction and subtle gestures to bestow popular taboos. All said and done, we also expect some twists and turns along the way. Even though I found the rehashed narrative somewhat engaging, the blatant part of it and its length has made it well short of being a classy one!


Among the leads, Karthika has clearly made a dashing debut in Tamil. Her cute and assertive reactions would go a long way in finding character oriented roles for her in not-so-many female centric subjects. She has a natural charm and it was well captured on screen. The same cannot be told about Arya’s brother (Sathya). His reactions for almost all the scenes were similar and did not even attempt to make an impression. The supporting cast was surprisingly solid with unknown names - especially the stepfather of Sathya, the inspector, the psychiatrist and the friend who betrays.


Music and BGM by Gibran was good enough. ‘Deva Devadhai’ was my favorite number and has been shot well in the cold locales of Ooty.


Cinematography by Jeeva Shankar himself was another major highlight. The pixels were yearning for attention and the angles were awesome - especially the top angle shots during the romantic interludes were brilliant and ushers in that feel of tender love that tends to transcend boundaries.


There was also a flash of brilliance during the action scene towards the climax which was choreographed in slow motion with a classy tune at the background. But the movie falters once again during the climax with a not-so convincing finish and can only be declared as a good attempt!!

Verdict: Worth a Watch, but NOT a Must Watch!!

Rating: 2 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , , ,


Irumbu Kuthirai (Iron Horse) - Get set, doze!




Before watching this movie, I was a wee bit curious of its content! Curious, because the subject was on bike racing - I really can't recollect any movie in Tamil based on such a theme. So that was one good enough reason for me to catch up. I was also expecting some thrills and decent stunts coupled with an engaging story line - was I expecting too much? The answer is a resounding yes!!


The movie opens up with a biker whizzing past a flock of graphically created (read it as pathetically made out) crows, only to end up in a crash. The dream of Prithviraj (Atharva) dissolves and he reveals the fateful day where he lost his father due to his negligence in driving a motorbike. So we get a slice of his life where he is depicted as a typical happy-go lucky guy who works part-time at a pizza joint and always ends up delivering the pizza late (for free), thanks to his heedful driving. He obeys traffic rules, hates people driving rashly and is seen as an ideal boy-next-door by everyone surrounding him. He meets Samyuktha (Priya Anand) and its love at first sight - “best friends” as they call it. He even goes on to buy a Ducati in order to impress his best friend. Then comes a lame twist in the tale where he has to rekindle his racing instincts in order to win his girl back from the antagonist!!


Debut director Yuvraj Bose has undoubtedly wanted to deliver a glossy package of masala with the ever stale one-line story of ‘Ramayana’. But at this age of noir and neo-liberal movies, can't this story be made on a much more engaging scale?  The only relief that came in as a visual pleasure was that the movie was set in Pondicherry with it’s characteristic offbeat locales that partially gelled with the narrative.


Amongst the cast, only Devadarshini who has been demoted as Atharva’s mother has managed to score. Even Atharva looked lost and made one to feel that his performance in his last outing in ‘Paradesi’ was just a one off. Priya Anand as the trademark ‘loosu penn’ Tamil heroine had nothing going for her. Raai Laxmi was made to run around with skimpy clothes with hardly anything to offer, Johnny Triguyen was reduced to our ‘rowdy next door’ and Jegan who is supposed to have ushered in the comic relief was not given much space. Also GV Prakash’s music needs a facelift badly. The title BGM made me feel if the theater speakers were defective. It sounded horrible.


By the time the twist in the tale was revealed, half the audience were dozy enough and were not even ready to acknowledge that the last big race was coming their way. All we ended up was with a ridiculously packaged empty gift hamper after all the glossy covers that came of it.


Verdict: Give it a miss!

Rating: 1.5 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , , ,


Kathai Thiraikathai Vasanam Iyakkam (Story, Screenplay, Dialogs, Direction) - Silver-screen Metadata!!




KTVI (I just cannot write the full form every time!) goes with the tagline, “A film without a story”. That’s not entirely true. Director Parthipan has made a movie about movie makers who attempt to make a movie and their subsequent challenges. So what’s the need for that tagline? I am still clueless; maybe it should have been “A film without a proper story” - but again that is a relative statement and varies from every viewer!!


I am not going to dissect the movie as it has been already done so (at least partially) by the director himself during it’s course. And if there are any complaints with regards to its narrative structure, then the movie’s tagline would come to it’s rescue! Parthipan is no wonder an interesting personality in Kollywood as he has managed to carve a niche for himself on and off screen. Be it a speech at a public gathering or a literary work like ‘Kirukalgal’ - each work of his would bear his unique stamp. But, the problem is that what he believes to be his strength is also his weakness because he always tends to overdo things such that they become rhetoric at times.


KTVI can be classified partially as a rhetorical work of an enthusiastic director who vents out his frustrations and rants on the humongous hurdles one should overcome in order to churn out a movie, thereby mocking at the Kollywood bureaucracy with the help of a bunch of new faces who are stewarded by ‘Thambi’ Ramaiah who seem to anchor the innings with poise and balance. The movie had so many subplots without a plot. Even the climax is an open ended one where the director feels that today’s audiences are intelligent enough to comprehend according to the context, which he also conveys through his main lead.


Some mixed bag performances from his actors, a bunch of trademark ‘Parthipan one-liners’ and some funky narrative meta-structures with a handful of celebrity cameos (Vishal, Tapsee, Vijay Sethupathy, Arya, Amala Pal and Parthipan himself) made this movie somewhat watchable without much complaints!!


Verdict: Average

Rating: 2.5 / 5

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , ,


Sathuranga Vettai (Con Hunt) - Con Handbook for Dummies!



Again it’s a late review and happened to catch up with this movie only 3 weeks after it’s release after reading so many rave reviews about it. The attempt was very unique, casting was well done and the script was engaging almost throughout.

A bunch of con men led by Gandhi Babu (Natarajan) go about swindling money from greedy merchants and general public by manoeuvring some uncanny tactics that ranges from selling multi-headed snake to Emu scandal to MLM scandal to rice pulling. Gandhi gets caught at times, but goes scot free, largely thanks to the bureaucratic system and “money power”! When he finds solace in the company of Banu (Ishara Nair), a victim of sort due to his own con game and prepares to settle down, he is confronted with a larger challenge to tackle. How he goes about beating the evil forces with his ever-handy con game forms the rest of the movie.

First thought that came to my mind as I was watching this movie was that it seemed to slyly blend a bit of ‘Thiruttu Payale’ and ‘Soodhu Kavvum’. Though the noir was the least common denominator of all these movies, the way in which the director goes about making the narrative much more engaging by narrating the tactics of the protagonist to con people (read as ‘greedy’ people) was like reading a ‘Sydney Sheldon’ thriller. He allows us to rattle our brains on what is the con mob upto before the actual act takes place and the tactic has worked out!! The heist pulled by the mob using the jewellery store is a perfect example for the above mentioned line of tactic used by the director.

Also each and every character performed to the script’s tune and made sure they justified their roles. Natarajan, the cinematographer turned actor was the perfect choice for the cunning protagonist’s role. The way he manages to con people was depicted so convincingly on screen such that it made good sense.

Songs and sentimental values at the end were a bit of a dampener but still the movie managed to race past the finishing line with a convincing script, peppered with dark humor and more than average performance by the artists!!

Rating: 3 / 5

Verdict: Good!

Written by Hariharan Anbazhagan in , , , , , , , ,


Jigarthanda - Cheers!!



For starters, Jigarthanda is a native drink of Madurai. It’s sweetened with different layers of essence. I happened to make a reference of this one in my review of ‘Sundarapandian’ a few years back.

‘Jigarthanda’ - one cannot think of a better title than this when the story is told with an effervescent and oft-used Madurai ethos (also I was mildly surprised at how film makers have till now left this title untouched, especially in Kollywood for every third movie hinges on the Madurai genre). Director Karthik Subbaraj who has captured the fancy of so many aspiring film makers with his ‘fairy-tale’ success story in Kollywood made a thumping debut with ‘Pizza’. Now Jigarthanda being his second movie, the expectations were naturally high, especially after the trailers went viral in the social media circuit. Also an itchy controversy like the postponement in release dates fueled its mileage, though I can undoubtedly admit that this movie would have not required such kind of publicity as it’s content spoke for itself and has strongly reinforced the fact that script is the real hero for any movie!

An aspiring director (Sidharth as ‘Karthik’) is faced with the challenge of developing a violent gangster script. In order to make the script look real, he decides to closely follow the life and times of a deadly gangster. He zeroes down on Sethu (Bobby Simha), a middle aged thug in Madurai who annihilates his detractors with poise. He goes about it smoothly until Sethu finds about it one day, where the twists and turns in the story start. From then on the movie was a total roller coaster ride until the climax where there was another twist which was awaiting.

The script was rock solid - every dialog of each character was carefully measured in order to make it linger with the mood of the narrative. The first half was really breezy and was a pleasure to watch, even though it was riddled with blood and gore. But the dark humor in the script kicked in when the narrative got overtly tarnished with bloodstains. Not sure if the director has done the research the same way as the lead in the movie did, but nothing can be taken away from the script as being overboard as it was made to look so very close to the reality.

Another major strength was the casting - the clear winner here is Simha as ‘Sethu’, the fierce thug of Madurai. An absolute delight to watch on screen. It required a matured and heavy performance with a streak of fickleness and psychotic traits.  Simha has just grabbed the opportunity and has walked away with a ton of trophies. His body language was menacing, so were his dialogs and the way in which he delivered them. The scene where his killer gets trapped in a public toilet and his ensuing reaction is something that might be referred in future in some screenplay writing workshops. A fabulous job and a great gift for Kollywood.

Siddharth, though had a stereotypical role as that of a city-slicker, deserves a pat on his back for sheerly accepting to play an almost second fiddle to Simha’s role. Time and again he gets bullied by the goons and he doesn’t retard, just because he cannot. That was as well the strength of this movie as the director didn’t want to delve into something like a normal man turning into a superman when pushed to a corner. The facts were told as-is.

Karunakaran as the cliched side-kick for Siddharth was another revelation. A couple of years back it would have been Santhanam for such roles, but now that there are options which by itself is a refreshing change.

Lakshmi Menon is the typical demure heroine who is there for a few songs and some romantic interludes, but when compared to other beautifully written roles, her’s was the weakest, but that can’t be helped.

There were a bunch of cameos as well - however the pick of the pack was Vijay Sethupathy in the flashback scenes. His part was very catchy and garnered whistles from the crowd. Sidekicks for Simha were also hand picked well. Their variety in roles came in handy and made the dark humor get elevated to the next level. Another noteworthy mention is Guru Somasundaram as the acting trainer - truly amazing (watch out for his off-screen comment of “virgin rowdy” - I laughed with tears in my eyes upon realizing what he mentioned)!!

Music by Santhosh Narayanan was already a hit! His Gibberish song made its relevance felt to the audience only after it was watched fully! BGM was amazing, a lot many times Ilayaraja BGMs were used but segued well with the classy ones that has been heavily influenced by symphonies from the west!!

Cinematography by Gavemic was top notch - the camera traveled with the characters throughout - again watch out for the scene where Simha walks through a narrow passage only to reach a narrower passage that leads to a filthy toilet where characters converse, before the scene breaks into a mini warzone. Also the art department has played its part in detailing the scenes - watch out for the lights clad with a vehicle tyre over Siddharth and Lakshmi Menon during a conversation. The frames were brilliantly captured and Madurai was painted with his own colors - perhaps he has Photoshopped the city with his color palette!!

The length of the movie is almost 3 hours - the second half seemed a bit stretched by 15 - 20 minutes, but I’m sure Karthik would have his own reasons to dwell upon. I wouldn’t like to blame the editor for that. Editing on the whole had neat and intelligent cuts.

A hell lot of research would have gone into pre-production as this subject would have demanded a freshly brewed Madurai jigarthanda unlike what Kollywood would have tasted in the past. A slight representation of the ‘Saurashtra’ culture is one such example. We wouldn’t have seen that in any movie till now or even now people would be wondering whether such people even exist in Tamil Nadu. In another scene where a politician who romances his keep wearing a titanic mask and getting shot by Simha where he wears the same mask is another example at a brilliant piece of writing.
Renewed blood is pumped through this new age cinema from a new age director who is keen at mastering the language of cinema. I’m sure such efforts would not only be lauded but rewarded promptly.

PS: Blood, gore and usage of explicit language time and again has earned an adult certificate for this movie. Appropriate viewer discretion is advised.

Rating: 3.5 / 5

Verdict: Go for it!!