Mariyaan – Movie Review

Bharath Bala’s Mariyaan is getting a huge response all over. As we all know, Dhanush is an excellent actor, and he has again proved this with Mariyaan.

The movie has benefited Dhanush and Bharath Bala. After smashing B-Town audience with Raanjhanaa, Dhanush is all set to impress his native audience again.

Mariyaan deals with the story of construction fishermen (Dhanush) who will be having a close bond towards sea, as it is the place where he earns his livelihood. He calls himself a ‘Prince of Ocean’. The way he earns his livelihood is shown in more adventurous way. More than Dhanush’s love interest, Panimalar (Parvathi Menon) has played the role of a model wife, who forces Dhanush to change his job and asks him to go to Sudan. The movie takes a turn at this movement.

In some point of the time, the movie reminds us the recent releases, Mani Ratnam’s Kadal and Neeraparavai.

The camera work of the international fame, Marc Koninckx is remarkable, the music by AR Rahaman will keep the audience humming even after they are out of theatre.

Vathikuchi Movie- Review

Fox Star Studios and AR Murgadoss Productions Vathikuchi directed by P Kinslin is half baked and has too many plot holes.

However, the first half of the film is quite entertaining, but post interval the film drags and a forced climax makes the debutant hero larger- than- life which sticks out like a sore thumb.

Sakthi (Dileepan) is a happy, do-gooder share auto driver, who lives with his picture perfect family ( Saranya & Raja and a little sister). He is head-over- heels in love with his neighbour Leena (Anjali), a bubbly mischievous girl who is doing a ‘spoken English course’.

Now three separate gangs are out to kill Sakthi, due to his do-gooder nature which gets him into trouble! The three gangs baying for his blood are a hired killer Sampath who has personal animosity, Jayaprakash a jeweller who has a score to settle with him and his neighbour Jagan who finds him a hindrance in his nefarious activities!

How our hero romances and wins over his girl and single-handedly takes down his detractors forms the rest of the story. There are far too many plot holes in the script. It is neither logical nor convincing and the film goes on and on for nearly two-and-half hours. Characters with no motivation just want to bump–off a share auto driver!

The script is made with the sole purpose of making Dileepan an action hero who can also romance. He is just about convincing as an action scenes but requires to improve his dialogue delivery and has a single expression throughout the film.

Anjali is typecast as the chirpy middleclass girl, and looks like an extension of her Manimekala character in Engeyum Eppothum. The villains Sampath and Jayaprakash are apt, but comedian Jagan in a negative role looks stiff!

The highlight of the film is definitely Ghibran’s peppy music, especially the song ‘Kuru Kuru…’ which is the pick of the lot. On the whole the film just does not live up to the pre-release hype surrounding it.

Onbadhula Guru Movie – Review

director PT Selvakumar has come out with a slapstick mass comedy entertainer. There are times when you laugh hysterically at the most outlandish jokes, gags and situations.Onbadhula Guru promised laughter and entertainment and it sticks to its promise, giving you no time to breathe, gasp, feel, absorb react or relate. The humour is mostly slapstick and the plot wafer thin. If you are willing to chuckle, giggle and chortle at this far-out plot, mindless jokes, then it may satisfy you.

It makes no qualms of narrating a wafer-thin predictable story of four guys named after popular Tamil films Billa (Vinay), Kochadaiyaan (Aravind Akash), Guru (Charms), Ranga (Sathyan) and who are fed up of their wives and decide to take a break, go for a holiday and lead a bachelors life. They set off to Bangalore where they meet Charles (Premji) an old friend and Sanjana (Lakshmi Rai).

K’s music is peppy, and Vaa Machi… is the pick of the lot. The dialogues are laced with wit and soaked in humour and bring the house down on several occasions. The promos never promised path-breaking or thought-provoking cinema. So why look for logic in this one?

It is another spoof movie on Kollywood and top stars including a large helping of popular punchline dialogues and songs. However, be cautioned, it is a loud film targeted at the masses and delivers laughter in abundance. Leave your brains behind to enjoy this madcap entertainer!

Sundattam Movie – Review

Written and directed by Brahma G Dev, Sundattam is a violent story of gang wars and how an innocent young man getting sucked into crime for no fault of his.
It looks like the director had a template ready and most of the scenes, locations, characters and even dialogues are inspired from a dozen similar films set in Madurai and North Madras. So what is different? It is the game of carom which forms the crux of the story.

The fundamental problem of the story is that, its plotline is so flat and there is nothing that you haven’t seen before. Prabhakaran (Irfan) is a young man who is a master at the game of carom. He is the typical boy-next-door who does nothing in life but hang around in his area with a bunch of guys, playing carom and drinking beer.

His dad wants him to go to Dubai and work but when he goes to meet the agent, he gets into a small fight with the local guys who are henchmen of a dreaded goonda Bhagya Annachi (Mahadevan). In the meantime, our hero falls in love with his sister’s friend (Arundathi). He is on the run but soon realising his talent for the game, annachi takes him under his wings as he runs illegal clubs in the city. This irks Kasi the main carom player and he wants to take revenge on Prabha.

New boy Irfan is good and has done a neat job and so is rest of the cast. Songs are average but camera especially in the climax fight is laudable. But too much of drinking, smoking, snorting, muted bad language and violence will not appeal to family and lady audiences.

Paradesi Movie – Review

Welcome back to real solid film-making. Bala`s Paradesi is one of the best films to have emerged in Indian cinema in recent times.

At a time when Tamil commercial cinema is trapped in crass comedy and fraudulent mass movies, here comes pure cinema. It has honesty and depth, which is mostly missing in Tamil movies today.

The film has been adapted from Eriyum Panikadu a Tamil translation of the 1969 novel Red Tea by Paul Harris Daniel which deals with Harris` encounters with enslaved tea plantation workers in the Madras Presidency in colonial India.

Paradesi is set in the pre-independent late 1930s in a tea plantation run by British somewhere in Munnar. The people in a poor Tamil village are conned by a ruthless middleman or ‘Kankani’ to work in the plantation promising them decent wages.

Little do these innocent people realise that they are going to be enslaved in a tea plantation as ‘coolies’ for the rest of their life. It is a double edged sword: Those who try to escape end up with their calf muscles cut off and those who reluctantly stay behind fall prey to deadly diseases and torture.

In short there is no escape from the hell and they are destined to be slaves for life!

The big plus that makes Paradesi work is Bala`s characterisation. The characters are raw and the kind of emotional turmoil they undergo is something that today’s film-makers would not dare to do.

Bala also takes a dig at the way Christianity was thrust down the throat of natives by missionaries masquerading as doctors, providing health care and food.

The acting is first rate. Atharvaa is outstanding as Rasa or Ottu Perukki, you can feel his anguish especially in the last scene when he realises the futility of it all. Bala is also able to extract a spellbinding performance from Vedika as Angamma and Dhansika as Maradhagam. Each and every actor has come up with perfect portrayals including 200 junior artists which enrich the story telling.

The film is a visual stunner. Chezhiyan`s camera speaks for itself, with a washed out hue that highlights the agony in the story. The first look of the village and the top-angle camera in the climax are good.

Editor Kishore has made it racy at 2 hrs and 3 minutes without too much melodrama. GV Prakash Kumar`s songs and BGM serve as the spine of this enterprise, emerging expectedly as one the film’s biggest strengths.

Paradesi may be too dark for some viewers. But here is a definitive movie that touches a deep emotional chord and will leave a lump in your throat. Paradesi is definitively a classic with grace and power. Hats off to Bala for taking the road less traveled, and that makes all the difference.