JANNAL ORAM MOVIE REVIEW

'Jannal Oram' marks the comeback of Karu Palaniappan after his below average performance in 'Mandhira Punnagai'. Karu is known for his sensitive portrayal and family friendly milieu, apart from his last project. Backed by some of his favorite artistes, can 'Jannal Oram' bring back the success to Karu Palaniappan, a once-promising script and dialogue writer in Tamizh cinema ?

The film has a big cast of artistes, and everyone has some screen timing to stamp their marks. But unfortunately, the high number of artistes does not add value to the script. That's due to the average performances and lack of emotional content for each artistes to register their capabilities in the minds and hearts of viewers. R.Parthiban, as the rural, middle-aged Casanova, mouths his dialogues fluently in a different accent. Vemal, is pretty much in his comfort zone and gets to romance the heroine in songs and pull off some action sequences. Vidharth leaves a better impression on us, although his characterization was just a mere extension from the protagonist role he did in 'Mynaa', albeit with a twist. Among the ladies, both Poorna and Manisha Yadav have limited acting scope, though the latter had more screen timing. A gang of character artistes such as Ramana, Rajesh, Yuvarani, Ilavarasu, Santhana Bharathi, Sanjay Bharathi, Bala Singh, Sri Ranjani, Singampuli, Krishnamurthy and etc get to do their usual stuffs.

Dhilip Subbarayan's action choreography was apt for Vemal, Vidharth and Parthiban. It was not over the top, but not fiery, as well. Rajeevan's production design complemented the script very much. The rural house setup was apt for the milieu of the script, with relevant props. The village setup too looks very much believable. Simple, but neat work from one of the best ! Saravanaa, could have done better with the editing department. The proceedings in the second half moves at a snail's pace, and some trimming could have increased the tempo of the script. Arbhindu Saaraa, definitely owns the film, through his good cinematography works. The hill stations have been very aptly captured from his lenses and at the same time, Arbhindu maintained a natural look for the whole film, which is very much the style template of Karu Palaniappan's films. His experimentation with different angles or view-points of the bus, is commendable.

Vidyasagar, the trusted aide of Karu Palaniappan, disappoints us with below average song compositions. Though melodious, they don't capture your attention nor the interest, pretty much. "Athili Pathili" is the opening credits song, shot on the lead characters' bus' journey it makes in a day. The hilly terrains and lush greenery is a cool sight for the eyes. "Ennadi Ennadi" also has the bus as the backdrop, but the focus is on the characters this time and Vemal gets to woo Manisha in this song, shot with montages. "Unnai Paarkkama" was shot on Vemal and Manisha Yadav, against the backdrop of Athirappilly waterfalls and its surrounding lush and green forests. "Aasa Vacha" had a village festival backdrop, with apt props by Rajeevan for the production design side. The song also had separate shots of Vemal-Manisha and Sanjay-Poorna, interspersed into it. "Ela Malathoppu" is a situational song, and covered most of the lead characters' dark moments they were facing through. "Aatho Appatho" is a promotional song which was not used in the film. The song had the puppet play shot, as its backdrop. The background score was quite ordinary, for Vidyasagar's standards.

Though Karu Palaniappan has made this film, the script and screenplay does not belong to him, and its the first time Karu has attempted a remake film. 'Jannal Oram' is the official remake of the 2012 Malayalam film, 'Ordinary' which turned out to be a super-hit. The story was written by Sugeeth and screenplay by Nishad K.Koya and Manu Prasad, the makers of the original film. The problem with the film, is that it moves at a leisurely pace and the viewers could not muster what to expect from this film, even from half-way into it ! Karu, slowly introduces us to each characters one by one, and that proceeding had nothing novel in the methodology perspective. The first half was insipid, and the only thing which kept us watching were the dialogues, written by Sugunakumar K.E. There are a few sharp dialogues, atypical of Karu's film dialogues, but they are few and far between. There is an unexpected twist just before the climax, but it was far too late to save the film and was overtly stretched, as well. Karu Palaniappan, should have done more homework in fine tuning the original script, to suit the tastes and pace of a typical, 'good' Tamizh-film. Nevertheless, kudos to Karu for delivering a very clean film, which can be watched by anyone.

'Jannal Oram' - Below average showing from Karu Palaniappan. Where's the guy who made 'Parthiban Kanavu' ?!


Ratings: 2.25/5 STARS

BY:TAMIL

KAAVALAN MOVIE REVIEW

After facing numerous problems and hurdles, Vijay finally managed to release his eagerly awaited Kaavalan at one of his most crucial moments in his career. He's facing a crisis with back to back super flops considering that he's a super star. He has teamed up with Siddique after the super success of Friends and remaking a Malayalam film which was originally written keeping Vijay in mind. To be honest, Vijay must be thanked for giving a clean movie with no ridiculous stunts, over the top heroism, lame punch dialogues, crass villains but delivering a cool, sweet and cute movie which shows that Vijay is just not a star but also an actor.

Watching Vijay performing in mellow and cute love scenes is a big relief for the normal audience considering all the rubbish he threw out for the past few years. This movie is a throw back to the 90's era where Vijay was popular at the time for being a ladies man with soft and cute mannerisms. It's seriously nice to see him enact emotional scenes with aplomb and at the same time holding the audiences' attention with his screen presence. His transformation as a stiff and strict bodyguard with a touch of humor to the soft and love-struck guy was smooth and touching. The scene in the park where he was about to meet his 'lover' was truly touching and sweet where he portrayed the emotions of tense and calmness at the same time was a truly subtle acting from him. It shows the years of experience he has in the film industry. Added to that his dressing sense was pretty good in this film with most of his costumes looked contemporary and neat which presented him as a smart looking guy. Not to forget his emotional acting in the climax and as well his famous comedy timing, Vijay gave a very good performance as an actor this time. Asin is back after a small gap and she just sleep walked through her role. It took a few moments for her to deliver her histrionics as an actress of substance although in certain scenes she looked bad with the make up and the chemistry between she and Vijay is missing this time. Vadivelu was a riot in certain scenes especially with his 1 liners like "Private Number/Parvathy Nambiar" and the "Paavam Avare Confuse Aayittaru" dialogues being the best and the best scene would be the one where he gets bashed up in the womens hostel and how he complaints it to the others was an absolute laughter. Other than tat comedy scenes were pretty lame. Other cast members did their role as it was needed.

Technically the film doesn't deliver anything big. Stunts by Siva complemented well with Vijay's fighting style and it wasn't over the top. NK Ekhambaram's camera was just nice with the last fight scene being the highlight of his work. Vidyasagar gave a couple of hummable tunes like Step It Up and the Yaaradhu songs but should have done better with the BGM as it was too melodramatic at times. Song picturizations were not impressive though except for the starting part of the Pattam Puchi song involving the graphic works.. Siddique should have tweaked the first half of the film as until the interval, the movie doesn't show of anything promising and where it is heading to. Although the ending was touchy and sweet it could have been changed to something more realistic as it would have been more poignant.

Overall, Kaavalan is a decent film from Vijay after a very long time and it was just nice to see him do some real acting and deviating from his usual masala action movies. A cute, sweet film with a touching end is what Kaavalan is all about. It's not a great film but the same time not a bad one either. Only disappointment is the decision of Vijay opting out of 3 Idiots remake which would have helped him sustain the good momentum given by Kaavalan on his path to redemption. Hope more directors approach Vijay with simple and realistic scripts to help him show his histrionics as an actor.

Rating: 2.5/5 STARS

BY: TAMIL

SIRUTHAI MOVIE REVIEW

Karthi has come out with his latest release after back to back hits and for the first time has done double roles in this film which is quite an achievement considering the fact that he's just few films old. He has chosen to do a remake from a hit Telugu film which is the practise of the current breed of actors. It is a very difficult task of remaking that particular film as Ravi Teja has a unique body language which can be hard to imitate. We'll see how Karthi has handled the roles..

First and foremost, this film is the most mass masala film Karthi had done. It may not go down well with the upper class people but for the masses it's pure delight. The story has a good scope of producing a gripping and tight screenplay but then the director choose to remake scene by scene and even there's a disclaimer in the beginning of the movie which claims that keeping the benefit of the viewers in mind every character speaks Tamil although most of the scenes happen in Andhra Pradesh. Although it balances the aspect of heavy Telugu flavor, it still doesn't connect with the nativity of Tamil audiences.. Anyhow, this movie delivers all the necessary ingredients of a mass movie.. Heroism filled lead character(s), glamorous heroine, emotional fight scenes, sentiments and a big gang of henchmen who as usual gets bashed up single handedly by the hero. It's the old lame style of 70's and 80's mode of story telling but what makes it watchable is the performance of Karthi but then it's filled with crude and crass dialogues which makes women feel sick and disgusted..

As for Karthi's fans, this movie is a real treat for them.. He's just simply good with his acting histrionics.. As the pickpocket Rocket Raja, he maximises the usage of comedy timing to near perfection and he gelled well with Santhanam. As a tricky, smart, pervert and notorious pickpocket he was rocking. The comedy scenes of him barging into the wedding house with Santhanam and also runnin away with the possesions of Mayilsamy was the highlights. As Rathnavel Pandian, the police officer, he was ferocious and determined and showed the characters of a Siruthai by not giving up till the end. His introduction fight scene in the villain's house was powerful and it really showed how much he has put into effor to get the body language and modulation of voices correctly. But then the scene which shows the entry of Rocket Raja as Rathnavel Pandian was just too hilarious and Karthi proved he's an accomplished actor in the scene where he breaks down hearing the kid's cry of sending her to back to the dead mom..Tamannah was just needed for the glamour quotient and so far this is her most revealing role. Made many boys' hearts go sigh.. Santhanam made use of his scenes quite well with funny 1 liners as Kattupuchi..

Technically there's nothing much to say as all departments worked appropriately. The art director did well with the deco's of Rocket Raja's house (the AVM globe was a touch of class) and the villain's house. Velraj's camera was adequate and the fight scenes in the rain was well captured. Vidyasagar is a big letdown as all the songs sounds similar and gives out a cliched sense to the viewers. Stunts were over the top except for Karthi's intro fight scene in the villain's house. On the whole this movie is just pure commercial and we must thank Karthi for marketing it properly with the tagline 70% comedy and 30% action which really tells the true nature of the movie. Watch it if you don't mind mindless masala and if you are a Karthi fan..

Rating: 2.5/5 STARS

BY: TAMIL