Production : GV Prakash Kumar
Direction : Vikram Sugumaran
Cinematography : Ragul Dharuman
Music : NR Raghunandan
Lyricist : Ekadesi
To the ordinary movie buff, it is easy to relate this movie with Agni Natchatram, Kizhakku Seemayile, Thevar Magan or Raktha Charitra. To the layman, it is a emotional drama where revenge and loyalties set in motion a chain of events depicted in the movie. I could sense a lot of Mahabharata – which translates to real life event and real people, not some idealized commercial BS. Any story line from this Epic would make a good drama. This movie is plain and simple brilliance – thanks to the director-writer, surprisingly new acting talents and I should add a good lyricist. Music to me showed talent and inexperience.
Talk about uncermonious starts, this
one should tops the lists. It starts with a village slang which is
difficult to comprehend and the setting is a death of an important
guy in the village. It starts as a narrative of his life thru some
koothu artists. Takes a few minutes to align our ears, by which time
we missed some dialogs. But nothing that reduced the potency
of the story that followed.
Lot of taboos broken in this product –
all new faces, a weak opportune villain, everyone has some failing, revenge is the strongest
emotion portrayed (while containing bloodiness to very few scenes,
thus avoiding repulsion). I was surprised with the first half of
the movie – the amount of information packed within. There were
atleast 8-10 characters – all their profiles were developed in
depth and the stage was set by the interval for what then appeared to
a gory blood bath. But the story developed further, loyalties changed
and tested. Story jumped a few more unexpected hoops, with minimal blood
spilled at the end. Felt more real world than fiction.
Climax again reiterated the fact that
life moves on. There is remorse and regret in some characters, there
is a greater sense of revenge and vested interests in others - a
perfect base for a sequel. Direction, dialog and screenplay were
awesome to say the least. Thanks partly to the director, the new
comers showed so much finnesse and added so much to their characters.
This could have easily been a 3.5 hour movie – had it not be for the
village slang which was most direct and conveyed the maximum meaning
with the minimum possible words. There were experiments done on
cinematography – fixed camera angles, long uncut shots to mention a
few. Music and BGM were ordinary and probably the only low point for me.
Lyrics fit the melody beautifully well – simplicity of words and a
nice fit to the rhyme - felt hints of kannadasan(me a total
fanboy).
Flawless and concise first attempt. Hats off to the producer and director.
PS: saw the review in The Hindu –
totally outrageous, stupid and opinionated. Does the reviewer have
any sense of style or technique? May be he walked into the theater
to escape a miserable family...
