JANAKAN

JANAKAN

Theatre : TVM Sreekumar
Date & Showtime: 08/04/2010, 6.25pm
Status : Balcony Full, FC 95%

S.N.Swamy, the master of crime thrillers in malayalam cinema is back with an engaging script which was presented without any heroism or lengthy dialogues of glorificaion of heroes. The one line of the story is written in the poster below. Watch the movie to know the answer to the question HOW????

Story
The movie starts with police chasing Vishwanathan(SureshGopi), Monayi(Bju Menon) & Pazhani(Harisree Ashokan) as three of them together killed three people. All three were asked to meet Advocate Sooryanarayanan(Mohanlal) before surrendering to police. The story unfolds as flashback like Vishwanathan's daughter was brutally raped and murdered and this was the revenge. The rest is how Sooryanarayanan helps them to get out of this case.

Performances
Before mentioning about performances, I want to mention one thing : All the characters in this movie are presented very natural without any cinematic gimmicks.

Mohanlal as advocate Sooryanarayanan has given a commendable performance, a very natural person who speaks frankly to all. Script had provded interval sequence & climax sequence for Sooryanarayanan to shine. Also some dialogues like "Njan Cheethakkuttyaanu"(I'm a bad person) in between. SureshGopi as Vishwanathan has given a commendable performance. He too is presented very naturally only. So don't expect fire brand dialogues from him as in most of his movies of his. But the whole theatre enjoyed the scene in which he threatens Minister. Jyothirmayi,  BijuMenon, Harisree Ashokan, Shivaji Guruvayur were good. Ganesh, Kaveri & rest of the cast perfectly fitted the roles. Vijayakumar creates laughtr with his role as situation demands that.

The real show stealer of the movie is VIJAYARAGHAVAN as Police Commissioner. His character has got a number of shades : A loving father, a dutyful police officer(Watch the scene with Ganesh after seeing raped girl in hospital), an officer who fears persons above him in department, ministers & relatives of them. He's the one who got applause for all the scenes he got with his smart expressions, situatons povided by the script & a very natural performance. SUPERB SUPERB SUPERB!!!!!

Directors out there, this actor is still to be explored.

Songs
Olicirunne song was above average by M.Jayachandran. Background score by Rajamani was a disappointing one though the BGM for Mohanlal was enjoyable.

Technical
Everything was usual only. A movie like this needs crisp editing which was totally missing.

Script & Direction
Script by S.N.Swamy is a better one compared to his previous outings. He was able to make an engaging script this time & he's back in the track. He once again proved that he's the one in the  malayalam industry to work on law points in the movies. The movie got lots of claps and here the script is the hero, not the superstars in the movie.

Direction by N.R.Sanjeev is promising but needs to be improved. Handling certain emotional scenes were not good & closeup shots were more. A script like this can be presented in two ways, either as commercial thriller like old Shaji Kailas movies or as a natural one. Sanjeev was successful in presenting the movie naturally & commercially at the same time.

Verdict : Far Above Average
B O Verdict : HIT

Word of Mouth is good and the star cast is impressive to draw the audience. Worth for a second time watch too(with a responding audience)

PRAMANI

Pramani

Theatre : TVM Anjali
Showtime & Date : 6.30pm, 27-03-2010
Status : FC not more than 80 people, Balcony no idea(much better than FC, identified from claps & koovals during power off)

B.Unnikrishnan's new flick Pramani is a predictable flick with no surprising twists or turns in script, making & performances. He tried to make the movie, the same way he did Madambi. But what lacks here is a well packaging.

Story
Vishwanadha Panicker(Mammotty) aka America is a corrupt Panchayath president, who gets into other's issues and solves the problem thereby making money through illegal ways and makes official papers for what he gets in the name of Somashekhara Panicker(Siddhique) his nephew. There comes Janaki(Sneha) as a loyal Panchayath Officer who defends president's deeds. Caestro Vareedh(Janardhanan), the president of nearby village, is angry at Vishwanathan as he didn't allow the panchayath's development programmes. Vareedh appoints Mavo(Suraj Venjarammood) to destroy Vishwanathan. There comes Mangatt Vikraman(Suresh Krishna) who wants 100 acres of land for IT park, though not real. Eventhough Vishwanathan agress this in the beginning, he regrets for what he agreed as teacher(Lakshmi) reminded him of what was his mentor & her son's, Varkkichan's(Prabhu in a cameo) dreams. When Vishwanathan asks Somashekharan to stop the deal, because of the huge amount they're going to get, the whole family disagrees and asks him to leave as nothing was there in Vishwanathan's name. The rest of the story is how he stops the plan with the help of Janaki & Baby(Shanu), Varckichan's son.

Performances
Mammootty as VishwanathaPanicker has nothing much to do as the script demands nothing new. His dubbing also was not that good. Siddhique as Somashekharan, again a villain role & nothing special.  Suraj was irritating and evokes no laughter, except 2 dialogues. Sneha has nothing to do and the dubbing artist's voice was not suiting for her. Lakshmi's role is a straight lift from B.Unnikrishnan's pevious flick, IG. Janardhanan was OK only. Salimkumar was OK in his 3 avilable scenes and succeeded in evoking laughter except his intro scene. Rest of the cast has nothing special to mention. Anoop Menon, Prabhu and Kalabhavan Mani in their cameos were unimpressive. KPAC Lalitha was an unwanted character for a single scene.

Shanu aka Fahad Fazil as  Baby was refreshing but no scope for good performance. He performed well in limited scenes he got, especially the scene with Mammootty asking about his father's death.

Songs
Theme song was Average only. Karakarangana song was not that good. Oru Vennila song was good and well picturised.

Technical
Art diretion & Editing was OK only. Good cinematography by Sham Dutt though certain visuals seems repeated.

Script & Direction
Script vy B.Unnikrishnan has nothing new to offer. Each and every scene in the movie is predictable and something we have seen in many movies, even in his previous flick Madambi(which was a well packaged old wine in new bottle, even the Pathanamthitta slang). Script is an old wine tried to be packaged in new bottle but sadly, the bottle was the same he used for Madambi. An overdose of unwanted sentiments were there. As a dialogue writer, Unnikrishnan excels in many scenes, though screenplay fails. He could have worked a bit more to bring the freshness in screenplay. As a director too he offers nothing new in executing the scenes. Altogether Pramani is, at max average only movie mixed with serial kind of sentiment scenes & predictability.

Verdict : Average, at max
BO Verdict : Flop

Glorifying the hero towards the climax was a bit too over. The movie is strictly a DVD watch. Watch the movie in theatres if you have no other movies left in theatres.

VINNATHAANDI VARUVAAYA

Vinnaithaandi Varuvaaya...

Theatre : Thiyagaraja
Showtime & Date : 2.45pm, 12-03-2010
Status : Balcony 70%, FC just 50 people

After Vaaranam Aayiram, Gautham Menon is back with a feel good love story Vinnaithaandi Varuvaayaa & this time A.R.Rehman deals the music department.

Story
Karthik(Silambarasan), a hindu guy, is a mechanical engineering graduate who wants to become a film director. Jessie(Trisha) is a Malayalee Christian girl staying in the first floor of his rented home. Karthik falls in love with Jessie. The rest of the story how he convinces her his love, different problems they face and whether they unite or not.

Performances
Silambarasan as Karthik is best character of him till date as this one has no punch dialogues, superhuman fight sequences, dappamkoothu songs. He performed well though his dialogue delivery style still has the traces of his mass hero roles. Trisha as Jessie is the character around which the whole movie revolves. The whole movie is the incidents because of the inconsistent mind of this character. Trisha was looking good throughout the movie but performance wise I don't think that she diid 100% justice to her role. Ganesh, one of the producers of the movie as the senior cameraman and friend of Karthik in the movie makes us laugh with his comedy timing. Rest of the characters perfectly fits their role though nothing  much to do. NagaChaithanya & Samantha in their cameo roles were not that impressive.

Technical
Cinematography by Manoj Pramahamsa is top class, especially Alappuzha sequnces. Editing by Antony is excellent which makes the song sequences watchable repeated times though the way it is picturised is almost same. Art directon is superb, especially song sets & Trisha's home in Alappuzha on marriage day night.

Songs
Music by A.R.Rehman is good. BGM score was excellent.

Script & Direction
Gautham Vasudev Menon's screenplay is clear & superb without any subplots in between. Dialogues were fresh and excellent. The way the story is told to us reminds us of Gautham's previous outings Kaakha Kaakha & Vaaranamaayram, like the central character talking to the audience. Song picturisation also seems to be rehashed version of Vaaranamaayiram songs. Direction was top class. First half was excellent. Second half lacks pace as in first half & lengthy dialogue sequences made a bit boring. But the climax was superb and told in an excellent way. Altogether a good love story in Tamil cinema after a long time.

Verdict : Good
BO Verdict : Hit

In my opinion, new faces were the best option for the lead characters which would have been given a much more freshness.

THEERATHA VILAYATTU PILLAI

THEERATHA VILAYATTU PILLAI

Theatre : Thyagaraja
Status : Balcony full, FC 80%
Showtime & Date : 11.45am, 12-02-2010

After the disasters SATHYAM & THORANAI, Puratchithalapathy Vishal & his brother's GK Films Corporation comes together for their fifth flick THEERATHA VILAYATTU PILLAI, which is marketed by SUN PICTURES, name known for minimum guarantee entertainers. This one too entertains us.

Story
Karthik(Vishal), a lazy tad, only son of bank manager couples, wants everything best in his life, from a pen to his wife. So for choosing his best life partner, he falls in love with three girls at a time. One is Priya(Sarah John Dias), who has a policy in her life that she'll marry a person whom she falls in love with. Second one is Jyothi(Tanushree Dutta), who don't like men at all. Third one is Tejaswini(Neethu Chandra), who is a millionare's daughter & had a failed love affair in her life. Karthik falls in love with all three & towards interval Tejaswini comes to know about Karthik's intentions from her father. From then onwards the movie proceeds with how Tejaswini tries to tell truth to other two & how Karthik manages those & finally who will he marry is a simple predictable one but told interestingly on screen.

Performances
Vishal as Karthik had done justice to his role & he performed well. Towards the interval, Vishal's character had some grey shades too. The character that demands performance was of Neethu Chandra's, which she done justice, though it reminds us of Reema Sen in Vallavan at times. Among glamour show too, she leads. Sarah Jane Dias is just to look pretty on screen & looks different in different portions of the movie because of bad make up, I think. Tanushree Dutta was having a good role demanding some performance & she did it well to an extent. PrakashRaj as Tanushree Dutta's brother, who is a goon is good in his 3 scenes. Mouli as Vishal's father had done a good job. He rocks wih his dialogue modulation & expressions in limited scenes. Sathyan & Mayilsami as Vishal's friends did their part well. But it is Santhanam who rocks as Vishal's friend with his one liners & dialogues especially in first half. Sneha & Mallika Kapoor has nothing to do in their cameo.

Songs
Except second song "En Jannal Vandha", none of the songs by Yuvan Sankar Raja impresses & picturisation is bad & feels repeated. But the BGM was good with some good hummable theme music type ones, especially a violin music.

Technical
Cinematography was good, but Editing needs some trimming in second half as the length is 2hr 45 min. Action by Dhilip Subbarayan offers nothing new.

Script & Direction
Debutant Thiru's script is engaging one. Direction by Thiru has nothing special or new, but he was able to make the movie engaging & entertaining because of the script. The glamour show of the heroines, especially Neetu Chandra's could have been reduced. Also the length of the second half could have been reduced and it lacks the speed of first half. All the songs were below average & seems misplaced. Towards the climax, it became predictable, but the final scene made everything enjoyable. A good comedy first half & above average second half. On the whole, a good comeback for Vishal.

Verdict : Above Average
BO Verdict : Hit

SUN PICTURES's marketing will surely help this to be a hit. A better film from Vishal after flops Sathyam & Thoranai.

THAMIZH PADAM

THAMIZH PADAM

Theatre : Jayanthi
Status : 100%
Showtime & Date : 11.00am, 30-01-2010

We have seen many actors imitating characters of other hit films to make us laugh in almost all Indian & Hollywood films. But still we were missing a full-length spoofing movie just like Hollywood flicks, SCARY MOVIE series. Finally director C.S.Amudhan has come up with such a movie.

Story
The whole story is a fantasy type one. The story begins in a remote village called Cineapatti where Nattamai(Ponnambalam) orders to kill new born boy babies inorder to avoid those boys to go to Chennai & became heroes & become a problem for them. Those who refuse will be forced to leave the village & has to watch Simbhu(though not mentioned the name as such, said like one who do styles with fingers) movie, 50 times. When Siva(Siva) is born, his father asks to kill him. The woman(Paravai Muniamma) decides to kill the boy by giving kallippaal(poison). Then the newborn baby asks her to take him to Chennai so that he can become a hero. Then story happens in Chennai. Siva has friends Manobala, M.S.Bhaskar & Venneeradai Moorthy. There Siva falls in love & in between he does murders. Problem happens when heroine's father comes to know about the relationship. The rest of the story is how he wins her, who really he is, how he finds his parents, whether he able to find out the real villain named "D".

Performances

Siva has played his character with ease. Heroine Disha Pandey is good. Paravai Muniamma, Manobala, M.S.Bhaskar, Venneeradai Moorthy was OK only. Rest all did their part well.

Songs

Songs by Kannan are enjoyable. First song was a spoofing of all lead actor's intro song. Picturisation also simply rocks. Second one is an item number by former heroine Kasthuri. The first two lines reminds us fast version of "Njanum Varatte" of malayalam flick Chathikkaatha Chandu. Third was the rocking song sung by Hariharan, a melody one in which the whole song lyrics is the meaningless words of Tamil songs like "Omahasiya", "Nakka Mukka", "Dialamo", "Hasile Fisile".........The fourth song is OK only. Picturisation of all songs are good and filled with comedy scenes. BGM was superb.

Technical

Good Editing, especially titles. Cinematography by Nirav Shah is good.

Script & Direction

The real hero is dialogue witer K.Chandru, smart & witty dialogues throughout the movie. Screenplay by director C.S.Amudhan is engaging to an extent. The first half of the movie was 1hr length & was a rocking one with never a dull moment though no big twists or surprises are there(we do not expect one in a movie like this). But the second half of the movie is not that good as first half. From the point, when Siva went to Cinemapatti in search of his parents, scenes become a bit boring and the last 15 minutes was a disappointing one as the director could not keep the standard as the movie should have. Climax sequence was too childish and a bit boring and lengthy. On the whole, a good first half & tad above average second half.

Verdict : Above Average comedy entertainer

B.O.Verdict : Hit

What makes the story entertaining is the treatment. After Intro song, it's a scene from Thalapathy. Then develops with Baasha & Kandaswamy sequence. Then Kadhalukku Mariyadai, 7/G Rainbow Colony, Boys, Sivaji, Run, Ghajini, Kaakka Kaakka & lot others. If u have seen these movies, u'll enjoy the movie to its core.

GOA

GOA

Two big Tamil movies : TAMIZHPADAM(*ing Siva of Chennai 600028 & Saroja fame as hero) & GOA(Venkat Prabhu's third flick after the above said ones) released today. Finally I decided to watch TAMIZHPADAM as the whole movie was a spoofing one & promos were promising. When I reached theatre, two housefull show crowd were there & I was sure that the chances of getting a ticket is less than 1%. So went for GOA. Around 75 people were there. Once the film started, the heavy returns of TAMIZHPADAM made the theatre status as follows

Theatre : Thiyagaraja
Status : Balcony Full, FC : 85%
Showtime & Date : 11.30am, 29-01-2010

After the success of smart entertainers, Chennai 600028 & SA-RO-JA, expectations were high for a Venkat Prabhu movie as the lead stars too were from his previous flicks. But sadly the movie doesn't live upto the hypes & expectations.

 

Story

The story happens in a remote village in Madurai where people are not allowed to go outside the village borders not to introduce new culture and other things to the village. Samikkannu(Premgi Amaran), Vinay(Jai) & Ramarajan(Vaibhav) tries to escape from village. Samikkannu was treated as God's son & a flashback is there for that too. Vinay is the son of a military person & Ramarajan, son a the landlord. All three were punished like not to have any communication anymore. All three escapes to Madurai & there they see Vinay's frined marrying a foreign girl. They also decides to love a foreign girl and settle in foreign. With this aim, all three goes to Madurai to find their love. What happens to them in Goa is the rest of the story.

Performances

As in previous Venkat Prabhu movies, Premgi Amaren steals the show. Don't expect anything new, it's a remix of his previous characters & some mimicking of hit characters of movies. Jai's certain expressions and his ENGLISH were good , otherwise nothing special. Vaibhav scores in certain scenes. Aravind Akash & Sampath as gays were used for comic elements. Sampath played his role with ease with good voice modulation. Heroines Sneha, pair of Vaibhav has nothing special to do, Pia, as Jai's love interest is just for glamour show. The foreign girl who played Jessica as Premgi Amaren's lover was good. Rest of the cast did their part.

Simbhu in his cameo in climax does Manmadhan role again. Prasanna as Sneha's ex-husband was good in one scene because of his dialogues and comic timing. Nayanthara also has nothing to do other than a single smiling shot in the film.

Songs

None of the songs impresses. Some seems to be misplaced and became speedbreaker for the movie. Most of the scenes has BGM of many movies as in other Venkat Prabhu flicks. BGM of Jai-Pia episode was good.

Technical

Editing & Cinematography were good at parts. Only stunt for Premgi Amaren was enjoyable, though a bit over the board. Picturisation of songs were not upto the mark.

Script & Direction

Script by Venkat Prabhu had a promising start. But in the first half, once the characters reached GOA, lack of story & interesting twists made the movie a bit boring one. Director tried his best to make the movie an engaging one & the lead actors did their best for that, but without a proper script, what use??? No elements were there in the movie which makes the audience think what happens next. One such was made towards climax and miserably failed to entertain. Love track of Jai was boring. Director tried to make a fun holiday film, but succeeds only to an extent, only in parts of the movie. Songs in second half were boring and misplaced. The movie strictly remains as a one time watch. On the whole, GOA is a half-baked entertainer.

Verdict : Tads above average
BO verdict : Average

Venkat Prabhu + Chennai 600028 actors always cannot make good entertainers without proper script. If Chennai 600028 was a fun film & SA-RO-JA, a fun thriller, this one makes the audience bored at many places because of no surprises and twists.

BODYGUARD

BODYGUARD

Theatre : TVM New
Status : Balcony full, FC 70%
Showtime & Date : 6.00pm, 23-01-2010

The much hyped Siddhique movie, which was meant to be Dileep's comeback to series of hits miserably fails in every department to entertain us. Everything was bad here except Mithra Kurian & Guiness Pakru.

Story
Jayakrishnan(Dileep) comes to Ashokettan's(Thyagarajan's)home to become his bodyguard. Ashokettan  asks him to go to college with Ammu(Nayanthara ) and Sethulakshmi(Mithra Kurian) as their bodyguard . There Ammu fools Jayakrishnan by calling from a ID restricted mobile phone & tells him that she's a girl in the same college and she's in love with him. Towards interval she originally falls in love. How they unite is the rest of the story.

Performances
Dileep was a bad choice for the role of Jayakrishnan. Dileep misrably failed in handling the character in second half. At times, he tries to evoke some laugh, but a pure failure. Dileep couldn't handle the loverboy character & mature character transformation towards climax. His action scenes were pathetic as the story requires a better hero who could punch atleast five villains.  Nayanthara was a total failure, especially in sentiment scenes. There is no need of Thyagarajan to do this role which resembles Urmila Unni's character in Sargam towards climax. Harisree Ashokan's character Neelambaran was a straight lift from his same role in Chronic Bachelor. Janardhanan, Cochin Haneefa, Appa Haja, Nandulal has nothing to do. Zeenath was doing overacting. As in Chronic Bachelor, here too Seema.G.Nair was there as Dileep's mother with overacting.

Mithra Kurian as Sethulakshmi was the only character which was developed well & she performed well, especially in climax sequence. Guiness Pakru entertains us with his intro scene & some one-liners & gestures.

Songs
Songs by Ouseppachan is just OK. BGM was too loud.

Technical
Editing was pathetic. Cinematography was OK in parts. Costumes were bad. Action sequence was bad.

Bhagyalakshmi, the voice of 99% malayalam actresses dubs for Nayanthara & she seems to dub for Ganga(Shobhana) in Manichithrathazhu, rest of the time she does like a Fazil's movie heroine. Poor dubbing.

Script & Direction
I strongly doubt that the script was written and directed by Fazil & gave Siddhique's name to make it a crowd puller. Pathetic Script with bad comedies. No genuine comedy scenes were there. Everything was predictable comedies. There was no particular twists in the story as we have seen in his previous films. Script seems to be inspired from various other movies. Especially climax sequence was a mix of bollywood blockbuster Kuch Kuch Hota Hai & Sargam. Is there a person like director in the sets of this movie. Poor direction. All scenes which were meant to be comedies ended up as CHALUS with extra dialogues o explain that. There was no continuity in the proceedings of the movie. Utter crap script & direction. Siddhique seems to be following 80's style of script & direction which won't work with today's audience.

Verdict : Big Bore
BO Verdict : Flop

KOORA PADAM, The first disaster malayalam movie of 2010 is here. Save your cash and invest it for watching HAPPY HUSBANDS.