The most anticipated movie of this year with one of the iconic directors of india wielding the megaphone, with an ensemble star cast , more than talented technicians to support had finally hit the screens today.the first thing that disappoints you being a manirathnam film is its storyline which has nothing path-breaking, which was understandable with this being the modern version of Ramayana. the actual plot has undergone some changes which actually changes the polarity of the two leads from the original story line. this change actually further con-volutes and complicates the movie . okay, with this being a kind of movie which has nothing to offer in terms of story but we least expect the screenplay to do the magic but , sadly very few scenes manages to pull this off.
Another major disappointment in the movie is that none of the characters are convincingly crafted exceot the one of vikram. the character played by prithviraj, dev prathap was never convincing in his actions, even till the end we cannot conclude what kind of person he is!!!!
there are also very few scenes to justify the development of soft corner for raagini(Aishwarya) on Veera(vikram).Priyamani in an unhelping role as vikram's sister manages to achieve nothing, she just continues off from where she left in paruthiveeran. Prabhu has a dignified presence.
Another confusing character is the one played by Karthik,touted to be the modern day hanuman helping dev in his mission, was again a poorly written character,like dev he was never convincing in his actions.
One important thing to be noted here, the flaws lies only in the characterisation, not in the performances of the cast.Most of them registers a neat performance with Vikram and Aishwarya leading the list.
I personally had a feeling that this one being an modern day adaptation of a great epic which almost everyone is familiar of, manirathnam could've probably decided not to spend more time on elaborating his characters leaving the most hardest part in script writing for the audience's intelligence to perceive, but this decision actually exposes him out in the screen , making this 2.15 hours movie hell long and complex.
Technically the movie was outstanding and even pathbreaking. cinematography by santhosh sivan has just raised the bar of the standard of cinematography in india. he makes you feel the chilness of those exotic locales in every frame through his camera. Rahman with already having chartbusting music t his credit did not disappoint with the background score. editing was neatly done giving a clear view at the proceedings.Art direction was another thing to look out for, those mini villages in dense forests looked neorealistic.
apart from these the movie also suffers some serious lack of continuation in terms of location.and also i don't understand the need for artificial rain in most of the scenes where you can see sunlight visibly in every frame!!!
though for the most part the movie was saved by the performance of the cast , breathtaking tachnical aspects, the ending sinks the movie futher. the technique dev adopts to trace out veera was farfetched and we have seen those even in some B grade tamil movies.
Apart from some heartening performances and scintillating visuals the movie has nothing to offer.
Go for it only if youre a die hard fan of any of the cast or crew members .
A disappointing attempt by one of the finest film makers of our time....
