PATTATHU YAANAI MOVIE REVIEW

G.Boopathy Pandiyan, an excellent comedy script and dialogue writer turned director, is back after a three-year hiatus, with his last release being the dud 'Kaadhal Solla Vandhen'. He teams up once again with Vishal after 'Malaikottai', which was released 6 years back. Vishal has been consistently missing the elusive hit-status mark for his films, and his career looks like to be in an imminent danger. Will or can this duo strike back again, and that too with Santhanam in their company ?

Vishal is pretty much in his comfort zone with this script and he has delivered earnestly, what was expected out of him. His execution in stunt sequences are well filmed thus far, and it continues in 'Pattathu Yaanai' as well. His dance is improving film by film. And that's about it with his performance. As for debutante Aishwarya Arjun, well, she is there. In songs and the build-up sequences before them. (Was Arjun briefed about the actual state of his daughter's debut film ?) Santhanam, the only saving grace in the film, tries his best to muster some humorous portions out of the poorly written scenes. He has tried a different type of modulation for his dialogue delivery and it works to some extent, and his body language has marked improvement. But unfortunately, he goes missing in the second half, until the climax, where he makes an appearance for a brief moment. Murali Sharma and John Vijay play the roles of the main antagonists and only the latter makes some mark in the film, and that too due to his good comedy timing. The rest of the cast such as Chitra Letchumanan, Mayilsamy, Jagan, Karthik Sabesh, 'Vada Poche' Sarithiran, 'Pattimandram' Raja, Seetha, 'Besant' Ravi, Rajendran, Swaminathan and Singamuthu appear in insignificant roles, alongside Subbu Panchu and Mouli, who make cameo appearances.

Sai and Vasugi Bhaskar's costume designing was in sync with the needs and wants of the commercial demands of the script and thanks to Vasugi, Aishwarya looked more presentable in the songs. Anal Arasu's stunt choreography was also in sync with the necessities of a commercial caper, and the second half stunt scene, shot in the rain, is particularly more impressive than the others. Karthik Rajkumar's production design was minimal and his props, sufficed the needs of the sequences. A.L Ramesh's editing is just functional. Nothing experimental, in style. Vaidy.S's cinematography reminds us of R.D Rajashekar's work in Vishal's previous, 'Vedi'. The bright yellow hue, gives a bright look for the entire film and his shots for the second half stunt sequence, canned with rain effects, looked good.

S.S Thaman's musical score, is pretty average to say the least. Repeated listening might pave way for some sort of liking to them. "Thattungada Mealatthae" is the opening song of the hero and his bunch of friends. The song was shot on barren crop fields, with minimal art work and some comedy bit thrown into, involving a glamorous 'item girl'. "Enna Oru" is the pick of the lot among the songs, and is shot on the lead pair and which happens to be a fantasy song. The sand work in beaches and colorful streets are the highlight of the songs, with pretty costumes designed for Aishwarya. "Raja Raja Naandham", has a mix of dance and montages blended into it. The montages were some comedy bits and the dance portions were shot in an simple manner. "Poosani Kai" was shot at an open balcony terrace, featuring Mayilsamy and the lead pair, with the former involving in some quirky dance movements. "Thale Kaalu" is the archetypal 'kuthu' song warranted for such 'masala' flicks. The song features, as usual, colorful sets and groups of colorfully dressed dancers. Sabesh-Murali duo handles the background score department, surprisingly. They have done justice to their work by giving good focus for the comedy portions and also for imbibing Thaman's tunes into their re-recording.

Its unforgivable for someone like Boopathy, who has a very good humor-filled script-sense, to come up with such a tepid and lukewarm script. The script is jarringly out of logic and sense. The scenes are disjointed and there is no proper continuity in the flow of the screenplay. The comedy sequences are low in humor and high in irritable factor and many of them are unwarranted ! The story is prehistoric. The over-used trend of having Ilaiyaraaja's composition is also incorporated into the screenplay. Its just puzzling to come up with a conclusion, as to what was Boopathy's idea, behind this project ? Is it supposed to be 'masala'-filled humor film or vice-versa ? Only he has the ability to narrate the answer to us (hopefully !). As mentioned earlier, Santhanam's dialogues are the only saving grace in the film, and he alone has greatly helped the script in sustaining our remaining meager interest of us' on the film.

'Pattathu Yaanai' - Success still eludes Vishal, successfully !


Ratings: 2/5 STARS

BY:TAMIL