Pandian (Vishnu) is an unlucky man.  His attempts end up in failure. He wants to kill himself but even his suicide attempts fail. Finally, he approaches a dreaded dada and asks him to kill himself. The gangster (Amarendran) gets sympathy towards him and advices him to live. Pandian is adamant that he should die. Dada then cleverly makes him find the finer elements of life. Pandian accidentally falls in love with a cute looking girl (Pia), who reciprocates his feelings.

Now Pandian wants to live but unfortunately he is caught in the war between his lover’s father and his political opponent. The girl is kidnapped by John Vijay (the political rival) to blackmail her father. Pandiyan is Ready to go to any extent to save her. But he is faced with a stiff challenge as Kachitham (Japan Ravi), hired by John, is quite powerful. Pandiyan is also chased by the police who think he is the kidnaper. Watch the movie to know whether he could save her from the clutches of Kachitham.

Siddharth, a noted designer in Kollywood, debuts as director. He has chosen a fun film and made it an enjoyable fare. An element of humour is found throughout the film. Apart from many fun filled sequences the slides shown at the end of the film too are tastefully done.

The director has woven together the sequences of Pandian’s failure of his first love, the way the gangster makes him enjoy life, his feelings for Piaa, etc. in an enjoyable manner. The dialogues are competent.  The clash between Piaa’s father Jayaprakash and his political enemy (played by John Vijay) is hilarious.

The screen-play is not without flaws.  Pandian and his gangster friends’ efforts to locate Pia are quite ordinary. The abductor staying with the hostage at mid-sea with no escort at all is unconvincing. All these minor flaws are neutralized by the fun element and effective dialogues. The introduction of ‘Japan’ Ravi and the sequence at the stroke of intermission is well shot.

Vishnu, who impressed with his debut film ‘Vennila Kabadikuzhu’, is quite impressive in this film too. His emotions in duet sequences and romantic scenes are appreciable. He scores well in song and fight sequences too.

Pia, looks very attractive and glamourous. More than her dialogue delivery and body language, the director has relied a lot on the ‘speaking’ eyes of Pia.

Vivek repeats his pet theme of social criticism in the name of comedy. His criticisms are neither sharp nor new. The whole comedy track looks clichéd. Think something new Mr. Vivek.

Music director Devan Ekambaram has provided a couple of hummable songs. The song ‘Happy’ which shows almost all the young and upcoming playback singers of Tamil films has come out quite nicely.

Though the second-half drags a little the movie is quite watchable!

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Snippets

20^th Century Fox joins hands with our own Murugadoss

The famous Hollywood production house, the 20^th Century Fox, has produced many blockbuster movies in the past.  They are now planning to tie up with Star Studios and produce Tamil movies under a new banner ‘Fox Star Studios’.  The person Fox is joining hands with in Tamil films is none other than our own A.R. Murugadoss, who has reached dizzying heights of fame with just three Tamil films and a Hindi film to his credit as on date.

Some time back, a press meet was held in the city to announce the joint venture between the 20^th Century Fox and Murugadoss.  The diminutive director was spotted in high spirits and said, “Till now, you guys know me only as a director; now I have turned producer thanks to this association with Fox.  I seek your blessings!”

As per the arrangement that has been worked out, Murugadoss would produce films for Fox on a ‘first copy’ basis and he has reportedly entrusted one of his former aides, Saravanan, with the responsibility of directing his first film as a producer.  The film is likely to star upcoming heroes Jai (of ‘Subramaniapuram’ fame) and Vimal (of ‘Pasanga’ and ‘Kalavaani’ fame).

“There has been a wrong impression among Westerners about India as they thing all of us keep pet snakes at our houses.  As far as they are concerned, Indian films mean only Hindi films.  I took upon the role of a joint producer with Fox mainly to break this myth and to show to the entire world that in our Kollywood, we have extra-ordinary talents which can match up to the best in the world,” said Murugadoss.

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Opposition to ‘Sindhu Samaveli’ on the first day itself

The title of the film ‘Sindhu Samaveli’ can be quite deceiving as it conveys as if the film is something of a historical attempt tracing the origins of the people of Sind region in the erstwhile ‘unseparated’ India.  On the contrary, the films’ script has been drawing a lot of flak right from the day one when the film hit the screens State-wide last Friday.

Apparently due to the ‘leak’ of the story on the net, many seats remained vacant at the AVM Rajeswari theatre in Chennai on the day the film released.  After 30 minutes or so into the film, the viewers apparently got to know what was in store for them and felt very agitated.  The script had a lusting father-in-law who ‘loved’ his daughter-in-law and to the shock of the audience, the daughter-in-law ‘appeared’ to be entertaining the ‘lust’ affair!

One of the fans, who like many others just couldn’t digest the script of the film, started shouting in foul language, “What the hell do you people (filmmakers) think about yourselves?  Just to make money, would you be stooping down to any levels?  You are only spoiling the family set-up that is in place in the society!”

When he started shouting, almost all the viewers sitting at the back rows stood up and said in unison that they too belonged to the film industry and that they themselves felt ‘ashamed’ at what they saw on screen.  They pacified the audience saying that they would also raise their voice against the film.

Fortunately for him, director Sami, who was seated at a corner row in the same hall, escaped unhurt as he was ‘saved’ in time by the security guards!  This has been the latest ‘hot talk’ in Kollywood!

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Karthi’s ‘Naan Mahaan Alla’: failure or success?

The distributors and theatre-owners, who bought the Karthi-starrer ‘Naan Mahaan Alla’ at a huge cost of Rs.30 crores, have been very upset and shaken that they haven’t been able to retrieve at least of half of what they had invested.  Karthi’s last film, ‘Paiyaah’, was a successful film and did a business of Rs.25 crores which apparently forced the distributors to go in for his ‘Naan Mahaan Alla’ at a huge cost.

They were earnestly hoping that ‘NMA’ would easily cross the record of ‘Paiyaah’ but are now lamenting about the lack of response and enthusiasm from the public to watch the film.  Meanwhile, recent reports which appeared in a leading English language daily that many producers were willing to cough up Rs.6 crore to cast Karthi in their films hasn’t gone down well with these distributors.

“If someone is willing to give him so much money, why shouldn’t he agree and star in their films instead of making films under home banner?” is the question repeatedly asked by the irate distributors who are hoping against hope that in the coming weeks they should be able to recover more and minimize their losses.

Meanwhile, the producer of Karthi’s upcoming flick titled ‘Siruthai’ is said to be seriously thinking about pruning down the budget of the film apparently due to the result of ‘NMA’!

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Director Chellamuthu in love with heroine Meera Nandan?

Rumours are afloat in Kollywood that director Chellamuthu, who has been making a film titled ‘Suriyanagaram’ with actress Meera Nandam in the lead, is in love with his pretty heroine.  It is said that Chellamuthu expressed his ‘love’ to the actress at the shooting spot itself, thereby making matters worse for himself and the actress who is mid-way through the film.

Meera is very upset that Chellamuthu ‘purposely’ leaked the matter to the media to garner ‘cheap publicity’ for the film as well as for himself.  “All he (Chellamuthu) wants is to gain some publicity for his film and wants the media to look at his film.  For this single purpose, he utters some meaningless things.  It’s a fact that he once ‘proposed’ to me while the shooting was going on and I immediately turned down the proposal.

“I don’t know what Chellamuthu has in mind; as far as I’m concerned, I want to make it big in Tamil films as an actress of substance.  I want to achieve a lot; I, therefore, appeal to the media and to presspersons to just treat the matter as ‘closed’ for now,” concludes Meera.

Yes, we would surely honour your request!

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Film review: ‘Bale Pandiya’

Cast: Vishnu, Piaa Bajpai, Jayaprakash, Amarendran, John Vijay, Vivek and others

Music: Devan Ekambaram

Story & Direction: Siddharth