2 / 5
Vishal is back on screens after quite a while with director Thiru with whom he has already worked on Theeradha Vilayattu Pillai a few years back. Trisha and Sunaina are the female leads while J.D.Chakravarthy, Manoj Bajpai, Sampath, Sreeman, Jayaprakash and John Vijay complete a formidable support cast.
Pre-release, there were talks of Vishal having done his first dual role in his career. The movie also made it to the news for its long release related issues. Finally, it has made it today for Pongal without much fanfare.
The movie begins with Vishal being introduced as Shakthi, a forest ranger in Ooty who is required to fly to Bangkok to patch up with his estranged girlfriend Roopa (Sunaina). He meets Maya (Trisha) on his way to Bangkok and they hit it off quite well. Once he lands in Bangkok, he is lured into a maze of events as he is mistaken to be a Bangkok billionaire (obviously a lookalike) who also has the same name, but spelt as Sakthi.
Men and machine don’t seem to mind the fact that our Indian Shakthi signs with an ‘h’ but still their signatures are passed off to be the same.
After an interesting and gripping first half, the second half answers questions like why is Shakthi caught in this situation, what’s the basis of all this and how he manages to set himself free from the people who lead him into this.
The movie sadly loses fizz once we get to know the seed idea of it all. The villains turn out to be a big downer with their contrived and clichéd dialogs. The seed idea of the movie also seems to be too farfetched and childish, though it is an idea based on fantasy. A few noted Hollywood flicks have towed a similar line before with great success. Their names aren’t being revealed for fear of being spoilers.
The tall and handsome Vishal rocks in the action sequences as he puts his height and physique to good use to perform even Parkour routines. His performance leaves a lot to be desired though. He maintains the same stoic pose throughout the movie and seems to lack the all-important screen presence. Trisha has more screen time than the normal commercial heroine and looks ravishing despite knocking on the doors of 30. Sunaina’s is more like a guest appearance limited to the beginning and the ‘Azhago Azhago’ number. The rest of the aforementioned actors are all part of the movie’s main core and some of them fall way short.
The movie has been shot very well by Richard Nathan who also has a small role in the movie. The aerial shots of Bangkok are awe-inspiring and the ‘Poikaal Kuthirai’ number has been interestingly shot and placed very well too. Yuvan’s BGM score seems to have borrowed heavily from his score for another movie set in South East Asia, Ajith’s Billa, but it still sounded apt for the suspense actioner genre of the film. Among the songs, his score for the ‘Azhago Azhago’ track is melodious.
The action scenes choreographed by Kanal Kannan are among the other highlights. Each half has one solid fight sequence to talk about. When Vishal bashes people and sends them flying all over the place, it looks believable.
The movie doesn’t have any comedy track and the director ought to be appreciated for not bowing down to such commercial demands that too in the current scenario when the likes of Santhanam are almost a must for any mainstream movie. This lack of mainstream elements in the movie might also turn off the general masses that just come for some popcorn entertainment.
To sum up, director Thiru has given a movie which begins well and incites your interest at the halfway point. But, once the knots are untied, the end feeling isn’t one of satisfaction.
FINAL WORD: A half-baked suspense flick which fizzles out towards the end. It’s still watchable though.
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