Karuppan

Karuppan had posters and promos that somewhat capitalized on the politically sensational Jallikattu issue. With Vijay Sethupathi doing the role of the title protagonist everyone was curious about this movie directed by Panneerselvam. But what you get to see on screen is a mediocre extension of a tacky daily soap and with a plot that has zero novelty and unpredictability Karuppan is a bland film.

Karuppan is this fearless young man who has almost all the values and he is an expert in Jallikattu. His marriage with Anbuselvi happens very suddenly as her brother accepted a challenge thinking Karuppan won’t be able to contain a bull during Jallikattu. The movie actually talks about the things that happen after marriage as Kathir, Anbu’s sister in law’s brother had a love interest in her.

Karuppan is trying to satisfy those B and C center audience who nowadays have only Mr. Sasikumar to provide the “goodness overloaded” movies. From the beginning of the movie itself everything is clear. Bobby Simha is frequently trying to mess up the life of hero and heroine secretly in the most clichéd way. Panneerselvam presents him like a Shakuni but in reality he is as shoddy as a daily serial villain. If the daily soap loving audiences watch this movie, they will have a feeling that a mega serial ended within 140 minutes with just one commercial break. Loving husband, loving wife, caring brother and an extremely rude villain; there is no real person in Panneerselvam’s imagination. Everyone is on the extremities of a character. With nothing happening in the story that will create any excitement, you just sit there looking at the watch hoping to see the end credits soon.

If anything is good in this movie that is in the performance part. They have roped in quality actors to perform roles that have nothing in them to perform. Vijay Sethupathi manages to add a natural texture to a touchy husband. Tanya Ramachandran who is in her third film with this one seems like a promising talent. Poor Bobby Simha has nothing much to do here rather than giving just two expressions occasionally. Pasupathy, Kaveri, Renuka, Singampuli etc. are there in the star cast and Sharath Lohitashwa is there as an irrelevant antagonist.

Panneerselvam has no real agenda here. He just wants to make a movie that has the ingredients of a typical Tamil film. A hero who can do unbelievable things, a heroine who is an example of how a wife should be, family sentiments, abundance of songs and several other things one has seen in many Tamil films over the years. But in the midst of all these, Panneerselvam forgot to create a story that will create any sort of interest in you. The screenplay is full of predictable typical events and one would think that if Pasupathy’s character had the habit of watching movies, he would have easily guessed the villain. Cinematography was okay. Music isn’t really appealing in my opinion.

Vijay Sethupathi can also make errors in selecting scripts and Karuppan is one more example of that fact. Actors not being eccentric is the only relief in this otherwise tacky family drama.

Rating: 1.5/5