Prakash Raj is back in Tamizh cinema, and its his second directorial venture in Tamizh. A trilingual project, 'Un Samayalaraiyil' is an official remake of the 2011 Aashiq Abu directed super-hit Malayalam film 'Salt N' Pepper', which had Lal, Shweta Menon and etc in the lead. Backed by 'Isaignani' Ilaiyaraaja's music, and some good co-artistes, can Prakash Raj deliver an endearing and emotional rendition, of a script which has love and food as its theme ?
Prakash Raj is in his elements playing, a singleton 40-plus archaeologist and does a neat job. His reactions and expressions are repetitive and predictive, but that's due to the large number of films he has done, over the years in roles of similar stature. Sneha, creates a decent impression with her acting prowess. She has dubbed herself for her role and the character, suits her pretty much. Newcomers, Tejus of Telugu descent and Samyuktha Hornad of Karnataka origins, passes muster with their performances. There seems to be some serious issue with lip sync, thanks to the multiple number of shots done, for three separate languages. The rest of the cast such as Oorvashi, Aishwarya, Thambi Ramaiah, Elango Kumaravel and have done what is required from them, though no one leaves a very distinct mark, in the film.
S.S Vasu's costume designing complements the artistes' characters. Prakash Raj and Aiswarya's khaki based clothing, reflecting their archaeological backgrounds and Sneha and co, sporting a pretty, contemporary Indian wardrobe. Art direction plays a big role, especially for the amount of props used to decorate the home of the protagonist. K.Kadhirr has given plenty of attention to detail for the works on Prakash Raj's character's home, which is filled with unique antiques and not to forget, the elaborate cooking utensils. Editing is taken care of by a newcomer JO.NI Harsha. The editing work was simple and pedestrian, but it fits the flow of the screenplay. Nothing gimmicky with the effects, but the necessary output was there. Preetha's cinematography works just makes us salivate on all those delicious food and snacks, so tastefully shot and projected on the silver screen ! Its hard not to feel hungry after watching the shots of film, and if you have doubts on it, do watch the elaborate sequence, on the making of Joan's Rainbow cake ! Preetha's lighting and color tone usage, gives the film a warm and fuzzy atmosphere, which complements the mood of the film.
'Isaignani' Ilaiyaraaja's score has its own specialty but the songs are average, considering the extreme standards he has set for himself. The pick of the lot, "Indha Porappudhan" is a Qawali song on food, which has plenty of cut-shots on some of the famous food and snacks of Tamil Nadu. Be ready to salivate, while watching the video clip which has the opening credits as well ! "Eeramai Eeramai" is a montage song, shot on Prakash Raj and Sneha, developing their relationship through phone calls. "Therintho Theriyamalo" was shot primarily on Tejus and Samyuktha Hornad. There were some montages, shot mostly in up-market areas such as malls and cineplex, interspersed with lovely shots of the pair, in a deep woods, with autumn like scenario. The bright splash of orange sunlight effect, adds beauty to the song. Also, a rain set was also built for the song, with minimal props, which Preetha has dealt well, especially with the lighting. The final song, "Kaatru Veliyil" is a situational song, which highlights the separation between Prakash Raj and Sneha, which has montages on them. 'Isaignani' Ilaiyaraaja's background score sounds brilliant in some sequences, and goes silent in most. Raaja sir could have filled them up with beautiful bytes.
Modifiying the original story and screenplay, which was written by Shyam Pushkaran and Dileesh Nair, Prakash Raj's screenplay was very direct and linear, apart from a minor flashback. Viji and T.J Gnanavel duo takes care of the dialogues portion, and though most of them are dull and pedestrian in nature, there are one or two odd gems and a couple of quirky, funny dialogues. The real problem with the film, happens to be Prakash Raj's direction. The film heavily lacks the emotional connectedness with the audience. There are no character development, nor any explanation on how the main lead pair came to love food. Audiences are not able to root for any of the pair's love emotions, because of the lack of depth in narration and everything is passed off in the songs, to convey the plot development. The film fails to establish itself in a genre and dilly-dallies between light comedy and emotional drama. Also, there's an absolutely unnecessary sub-plot involving an elderly Tribal man, which is a waste of time ! And something hard to digest in the story, is the fact that the younger pair, who were cruelly selfish in jeopardizing the older pair's true love and affection for each other, for their own self-interest, walk away freely with no whatsoever of guiltiness, after they are busted !
'Un Samayalaraiyil' - Soulless cooking in a confused kitchen !
Ratings: 2.5/5 STARS
BY:TAMIL
Vijay Sethupathi is back immediately after his 'Rummy' with 'Pannaiyarum Padminiyum', the debut venture of S.U Arun Kumar of 'Naalaiya Iyakkunar' fame. Made as a YouTube short film originally, the debutante director has developed it into a full-length feature film, which narrates man's affection with his first vehicle. The short film gained lots of recognition, but can S.U Arun Kumar replicate the same success on a bigger scale, with the same material ?
Vijay Sethupathi, naturally blends into the script and has delivered an earnest performance. He definitely reminds us of 'Super Star' Rajinikanth's image in the 80's period. Vijay makes use of the right scenes, which he can score and score, he did ! He's just too comfortable as Murugesan, the lovable driver chap. Also, he shares a fantastic chemistry with Jayaprakash, which is evident in some of the second half sequences. Iyshwarya Rajesh pairs up with Vijay Sethupathi once again, and if she goes on to choose the right scripts, she's definitely a talent to watch out for. Iyshwarya is breathe of fresh air indeed, among the glut of nonnative actresses. Balasaravanan rocks as Peedai, and he seems to be a natural talent in comedy. His timing and expressions are just perfect enough for the scenes, and he does not over-do his lines, even by an iota ! The next big thing comedy artiste ? Hope so ! The film definitely belongs to the lovely senior pair of Jayaprakash and veteran Thulasi. The cute relationship of an old couple, was so beautifully enacted by both artistes, its definitely not an exaggeration to say that, they must have lived their roles ! Portrayal of mature romance is too few in Tamizh cinema, but this undoubtedly stays as one of the best, so far. Neelima Rani, Mahadevan and etc make up the rest of the cast with decent cameos by 'Attakathi' Dinesh and Sneha.
Moithen handles the costume designing and he has done a nice work, especially with the main lead characters, who resembled their social status and demographic class. Also, it has to pertain to the era of the early 90's, which Moithen did not fail to realize. C.S Balachandar's production design was very apt for the script, because of the nativity the script demanded. The props of a rural village head's home, were the highlights which shows the good background work done by the art director, in correlation with the late 80's and early 90's era. Sreekar Prasad, scores brownie points for his editing pattern, which holds our attention of the characters. But the editor should have dealt with the unnecessarily over-stretched running time, which further slows down the already, slow pace of the screenplay. For a multiple National Award winning editor, his vast experience could have come in handy. Debutante cinematographer Gokul Benoy makes a very promising entry with 'Pannaiyarum Padminiyum'. The way he presented the lovely Fiat Premier Padmini, as a character itself, speaks volume of his talent. Also, the interior shots and the meticulously handled, lighting and top-angle shots used for those shots, were just class !
Music is handled by another debutante, a very young Justin Prabhakaran. His compositions are full of melodies, and he definitely has a good future in Tamizh cinema ! "Enga Ooru Vandi" was sung by kids and has plenty of montages and has the Padmini as the main protagonist and her relationship with the villagers. Gokul Benoy's lens captures the barren landscape, very beautifully. "Pesuren Pesuren" is one of the most well conceived song picturization in recent times. It was shot on Vijay Sethupathi and Iyshwarya, with a funeral backdrop. The setting is of somber mood, we can feel the joy and love of Vijay Sethupathi, captured well by Gokul with plenty of close-ups. "Kadhal Vandhucho" is another song shot on this young pair and has a few montages, with good camera movements. The pick of the lot is definitely, "Unakaaga Poranthene" shot on Jayaprakash and Thulasi. The lovely song had even lovelier montages showing the beautiful relationship between the senior couple. Most of the shots were taken indoors, yet Gokul's camera work does not evoke any repetition. A similar track, "Enakaaga Poranthiye" features as a bit song and was shot on Vijay Sethupathi and Iyshwarya. "Aaraaro" is a pathos song, which highlights the separation of the vehicle from the family. Though Justin did a great work with the songs, he could still improve with the background score. Though melodious, some portions could have had a more mellow touch to it. He's obviously inspired by Raja sir, and he sure can learn a lot from the maestro's rerecording as well.
It is good to see that a young chap such as S.U Arun Kumar has the ability to handle the subject of a mature couple's love for each other, in a splendid manner. Also, he must be appreciated for scripting a subject which has no antagonist or any characters with negative shadows. S.U Arun Kumar handles the intricacies of relationship very well and he definitely extracts the best from his artistes, with his clear vision. The humor quotient is not forced and grows organically, along with the screenplay. Besides that, its nice to see that S.U Arun Kumar is a lover of old-fashion, which has its own poetic charm and essence, which was evident in the way he staged some sequences. But the film is not without its pitfalls. The depth of the film's script, is definitely very shallow and it is an arduous task to turn a 10-minute video into a full-length feature film. Added to that, the film has a slow narration and though it works well for the script, it might bore some audiences, who are lovers of fast screenplay. Also, S.U Arun Kumar could have avoided inserting unnecessary melodramatic and sentimental scenes, which looks forced and acts as mere speed-breakers. A more concise screenplay, would have done more good than harm to the film. But despite all these minor drawbacks, 'Pannaiyarum Padminiyum' is a welcome relief for us and has a feel-good, lovey-dovey element throughout the film.
'Pannaiyarum Padminiyum' - Charmingly and sweetly, old-fashioned.
Ratings: 3/5 STARS
BY:TAMIL
Haridas, piqued our interest with its trailer, which promised a clean-cut film, with very good artistes, in Kishore and Sneha, doing the lead roles. G.N.R Kumaravelan, who's last venture, was the pathetic 'Yuvan Yuvanthi', has handled a more serious but delicate theme of autism and the tough life of parents of an autistic child. Can the director redeem himself of a good career, with this sensitive theme as a backdrop, aided by good artistes and technicians ?
'Haridas' is fueled with very good performances, from the two main leads, Kishore and Sneha. The former plays an encounter specialist, who's life comes to a sudden halt, due to situations leading him to take care of his autistic child, all by himself. This film could be one of Kishore's most sincerest and honest performance, ever. His composed, yet heartfelt emotions and subtle reactions makes us to sympathize or even empathize with his character, especially in scenes where he is clueless on what to do next with his autistic son. Also, his macho and charismatic screen presence, makes him perfectly fit into the role of an encounter specialist police officer. Sneha, puts her heart and soul into the 'Amudhavalli' teacher character. Lucky for getting such a role, she pulls off a beautiful performance and her experience, gives her the edge in enacting the emotional scenes. Also, she has mastered the dialogue delivery capability and has handled the dubbing herself, which adds more realistic element into her role. Master Prithviraj Doss, has a very good entry and he was too very much natural in his role as the autistic boy. His body language, mannerism and screen presence gave the character more color and life. The rest of the cast such as Pradeep Rawat, Soori, G.Rajesh Kumar and etc did what was expected out of them, and Rajkapoor, as well as Yugi Sethu make wonderful cameo appearances, especially the later, who was in his usual witty elements.
Rajashekar's action choreography was good enough for the script, though it could have been handled well, especially when you have an able actor like Kishore. Lalgudi N.Ilaiyaraja's production design was simple, yet class. The opening posh apartment setting, the police quarters, and the climax warehouse, all were well set up and designed, giving the film a simple, but beautiful look. Raja Mohammed's editing was neat and the opening sequences were well handled. But the length of the film could have been shortened, which would have made the film even crispier. The movie, would not have been made to look high in quality, without the excellent cinematography by R.Rathnavelu. Randy's simple color palette, with natural lighting worked out brilliantly for the film. Each shot was picture-perfect, and the warm ambiance implemented throughout the film, complemented the script very well. Great work, Randy !
Vijay Antony, had delivered simple songs for the film, which fits well for the film. "Vellakuthira" is a pathos song, used in a particular sober situation. It was shot with few montages and the old house charm was captured beautifully by the cinematographer, with perfect natural lighting. The "Police" song, is a comedic take on the miserable life of police officers. It has an item girl with plenty of dancers, and was shot in the streets. Again Randy, has handled the natural lighting available for this song, pertaining to the situation and this time has more darker shots. "Vaazhkaiye" is a situational song, which acts out as a motivational one, too. It has lots of montages and small sequences interlaced in between those montages. Also, the camera angles, are an highlight of this song, as well. "Annaiyin Karuvil" was shot in a very photographic manner, with picturesque shots along the white, sandy beaches and also few montage sequences, fit into it. The background score was handled well, in most of the scenes bar some, which was too loud and melodramatic at times.
The film has plenty of heartfelt, emotional scenes, which adds strength to the film. The gradual transformation of the autistic son, was very natural and well presented. Although, the police scenes were well sketched, it takes the focus out of the main theme, though it can be excused. A little more maturity in the direction and script writing, would have made this film, an even much better product. Some melodramatic sequences could have been avoided, or as said, handled with more maturity. A.R Venkatesan's dialogues were simple and there are some good dialogues, peppered here and there in the script. But an even more astute writer, could have put in fantastic outputs, in terms of dialogues. Nevertheless, a good job by the dialogue writer. The build-up to the climax was fantastic but the end could have been different, since it felt a little forced and unnecessary. Yet, G.N.R Kumaravelan deserves a pat for handling a sensitive subject, without going too preachy or overtly sentimental. Also, kudos to him for glorifying the pains and sacrifices parents of such special kids, go through in bringing up their kids, in this complicated and tedious life.
Films like 'Haridas' should be encouraged and supported by audiences. Though the script has potential to be developed into an even much better film, yet bravo to G.N.R Kumaravelan, for a simple and family-friendly film. 'Haridas' - Is this from the same guy who gave us, 'Yuvan Yuvathi' ? Wow !
Ratings: 3/5 STARS
BY:TAMIL
'Murattu Kaalai', the remake of the evergreen Rajinikanth-Jaishankar classic was long overdue, with the production beginning in the year 2009. After three years, the film made it for release, and three years in Tamizh cinema is a big gap, because of the sea of constant changes we see in trends, artistes and etc. This film was started with the intention of reaping in the sudden popularity of Sundar.C as an actor but the scene has completely changed now, with him back to direction and, winning-ways as well with his recently released 'Kalakalappu'. Will this film reap any benefits by releasing?
Sundar.C, sadly did not and will not be able to match the charisma and energetic performance of Rajinikanth in the original. His good height and big size gives him a 'macho' halo around him but sadly, the performance is nothing extraordinary. Suman did a typical village villainous influential man. Nothing to talk about. Sindhu Tolani is there just for the glam appeal. Sneha has nothing much to offer, performance wise and shows a little skin here and there. Vivek as a transgender/transvestite was in his usual manner. Good body language and dialogue delivery but not all of his jokes evokes laughter, including the '16 Vayadhiniley' spoof with his regular partner "Cell" Murugan was insipid. The cast just did what they were asked to do and not perform out the character.
Technically the film has poor quality. Stunts by Silva was over-the-top most of the time, and only the climax fight on the train was a little decent. Shankar's art direction was minimal and detailing were not properly highlighted with simple pieces of work in songs as well. Praveen K.L and Srikanth N.B's fast-cutting helps the movie to go a little faster but nothing to impressive. Santtonio Tarziio's cinematography was pretty average and the opening song, as well as the climax fight sequence on the train was captured properly, though shaky at times. Srikanth Deva's tunes were very, very average. The iconic and legendary "Pothuvaaga En Manasu" song was lukewarm and dull though it was picturized on a grand scale with lots of fanfare. "Sundara" and "Bhonda" songs, the first on Sundar.C-Sneha and the latter on Sundar.C-Sindhu Tolani was poor with some montage sequences in the middle and the same orchard, paddy fields, barren lands used as the backdrop. "Punnagai" song picturized against the backdrop of a monument, also fails to impress. The background score reminds one of Deva's works and his contradicting sound plays, was weird.
The biggest flaw of the film is the screenplay and writing by K.Selva Baarathi. It was unimpressive, boring and lacks any energy. The director failed to tap genuine performances from his artistes, making them look like caricatures.
'Murattu Kaalai' has nothing to benefit from and the original should have been left untouched.
Ratings: 1/5 STARS
By:TAMIL
Prashanth, the man brought up with a silver spoon during his teenage years in terms of cinema expertise as his father Thyagarajan gave him all he needed to become a movie star. Dance classes, martial arts, gymnastics, fencing, horse-riding, and etc etc. Of course Prashanth had a brilliant opening with Vaigasi Poranthachu and subsequently delivered hit movies and that too under distinguished directors like Mani Rathnam, Balu Mahendra and K.Balachandar as well. After a lull period he came back with a massive hit in Jeans under Shankar's direction earning credits for his complicating double role performance as Visu and Ramu. Things were expected to look good for him but nearly 25 films after Jeans, sadly only a couple of them were good movies. For a star who has worked with big directors and good talents, he came up with countless of useless films and to make situation worse he had a torrid personal life as well. After 5 years, he's making a comeback with this big budget film Ponnar Shankar which raised some eyebrows with the trailer.
There was a great deal of expectations on the film with Prashanth donning double roles once again and plus a big star cast which includes, Jeyaram, Prakash Raj, Nasser, Napoleon, Raj Kiran, Prabhu, Khusboo, Sneha, Riyaz Khan, Vijayakumar , Ponvannan, Delhi Ganesh, Ponnambalam, Seetha, Sukumari, Santhana Bharathi, Lakshmi Ramakrishnan, Bose Venkat, and etc. With such a cast, audiences will expect a power packed performance from all but most of the characterizations were weak and don't really leave any deep impact with the viewers. Should say almost, all of the talented performers were wasted. Prashanth, showed all his extra skills and was apt for the roles of Ponnar and Shankar but he has very less dialogues to speak. Besides that the only artistes who were given scope to do some commendable acting were Nasser and Raj Kiran. Nasser oozes confidence and utters each dialogue with utmost care which shows the amount of experience he has. Raj Kiran delivered some power packed expressions which was luckily not over the top. Rest of the cast only has a few scenes between themselves just to carry the story further. Heroines, Divya Parameshwar and Pooja Chopra were just there for bringing 'colors & freshness' to the scenes (though we should be very jealous of Prashanth for being extremely lucky with heroines throughout his career having had plenty of good looking Mumbai heroines; and the two heroines in this film were former final round participants of Miss India).
Technically the movie was OK and art director Muthuraj should be appreciated for creating so many wonderful sets although films nowadays deliver even more realistic settings. Still he should be given a round of applause for a great job especially for the royal courtroom, song sets (the first song) and war zone sequences. Shaji's camera is adequate with some good aerial shots and slow motion capture (especially the solo song of the heroines). Don Max did well with the editing and stunts by Kanal Kannan and Ravi from Mumbai is OK except for some over-the-top flying and jumping which could have been done better and so too the graphics which was under the supervision of Prashanth. The big disappointment was Isaignani Ilaiyaraja. None of the songs sticks to our mind and the re-recording is just so and so. A huge letdown from the maestro
Coming to the captain, Thyagarajan should be appreciated for putting this film together considering the logistical nightmare of handling so many people in the film as thousands of them were involved in the fight and dance sequences. No matter how grandeur the film is, the script and screenplay is the main point of any film and Kalaingar's script is not powerful and should say quite weak. It doesn't leave any impact on the viewers which is a negative aspect considering that this is a historical script. Dialogues are very simple and direct but doesn't match with the story as most of it sounds very contemporary which won't gel well with historical stories.
Final verdict, it's a good attempt in Tamizh cinema but not quality enough in terms of a solid and powerful package though all of them should be appreciated for trying out something honestly.
Ratings: 2/5 STARS
BY:TAMIL
