2020, Tamil, YouTube rental, 6.4/10 IMDB, Directed by Dhana Sekaran
Much awaited multi-star cast movie, distances itself from the audience with the umpteen number of story lines and the crux of the flick being lack of depth for individual characters.
Madras talkies production, Mani Rathnam associate’s directorial, noteworthy list of artists including Sarath Kumar, Radhika, Vikram Prabhu, Aishwarya Rajesh, Shanthanu, Madona, Balaji Sakthivel, Nandha, Sid Sriram’s debut as music director, couple of trending trailers.. All this has placed the movie in an Elite Category before even the movie released.
The story opens up with characters being introduced alongside the revenge plot. You are lured to expect Agni Natchathiram kind of emotional plays. To an extend, the sibling drama and distancing son from dad does remind you of Mani’s epic flicks.
What bothers you is, the characters and the story doesn’t do what the director intended to, it doesn’t touch you in any way. It’s like listening to some boring story with no twists and turns and it clearly lacks that one thing that you can’t put your finger on. It may be that the villain played by Nanda, is no match to the bulky Sarath Kumar or the hefty Vikram Prabhu.
There are two characters that stick to your heart like glue, one is Aishwarya Rajesh and the other is Director Balaji Sakthivel. Asiwarya does become a little boring and repetitive from her recent sibling performance in Namma Vettu Pillai, but she does complete justice. Balaji Sakthivel, rocks with his innocent smile and dialogue delivery. His teddy bear look, adds more shades to his already cute big daddy outlook.
Vikram Prabhu has a solid role which he pulls off with ease. Madona on the other hand is lost with what she is expected to emote and the duo doesn’t convince you and goes no where.
As of Shanthanu, you feel sorry for the tiny screen space the actor is slotted in and it was a missed opportunity. There were many instances where his bonding with Asiwarya could have helped reaching out to the audience better.
There was this story link with Lal and Amitash which was totally unnecessary as it does nothing at all to the story. Instead, that screen space could have been put to better use in bringing out the love quotient between the two pairs.
Radhika and Sarath Kumar looks fabulous on screen, their pair is expected to bring in magic, but you feel let down as there is no such instance. After coming out of the prison, when he takes her out for shopping and dinner, their happiness is not translated to the audience. I kinda think it attributes to the lack of a heart wrenching BGM may be.
Remember the time when Rajini meets Radhika Apte after so many years of not knowing if she was alive or not, the music, the montage scenes, the childish bonding between the husband and wife, Santhosh Narayanan’s BGM was phenomenal in bringing out the true emotions of the characters.
A true let down, as the expectations were too high. A tighter screenplay with crispier direction would have made it a complete family entertainer.