Lakshmi

To like Lakshmi, the new movie directed by A L Vijay you have to be alien to genres and most importantly to the phenomenon called Prabhu Deva. Anybody with some taste in movies would have easily guessed something about the story of this dance movie and the sad part is that Vijay has not done anything in the scripting part to surprise us. With just predictable moments happening at regular intervals of time, it is the cheesy yet emotional climax that is giving some respect to this otherwise unoriginal movie.

So, Lakshmi, a school student is our central protagonist. She loves dancing but her mother who is a widow is strictly against it. So everyone except her Mom knows that Lakshmi is still dancing. A call for a competition on national level happens and Lakshmi with the help of a coffee shop owner named Krishna manages to enter the academy that sort of help kids to participate in that competition. This journey of Lakshmi along with the help of Krishna to be that well known successful dancer is the story of this movie.

I don’t really know whether I should say SPOILER ALERT. Because the spoilers I am going to say is simply the kind of character arcs we have seen in Prabhu Deva’s own ABCD movies and a lot of other stuff that we have seen in movies that depicted the rise and win of an underdog. A prodigy having a talent gets lifted by another person who couldn’t fulfill the dream of achieving something has been presented on the screen a zillion times. The parent won’t be supportive. The coach/trainer character will have an enemy who was a past competitor. The team will have ego clashes. All these are the ingredients of a script that one won’t call as fresh. And Lakshmi has all of that and nothing more.

Super Dancer reality show winner Ditya Bhande plays the title character of Lakshmi. There is peculiarity she brings to the odd character of Lakshmi and that was lovely along with the dance moves. Prabhu Deva is repeating himself in these recurring roles as the “failed-old” master. Salman Yusuff Khan was fine. Aishwarya Rajesh gets a role that doesn’t really demand her real talent. Karunakaran is there doing the typical comedy. Just when I thought I am going to get blown away by a never before seen version of Kovai Sarala, Vijay trashed my optimism. Akshat Singh is also there in a character role.

The problem with the making and writing is that they are trying to make a cliché as if it is happening for the first time. Prabhu Deva is such a famous dancer and introducing a backstory to his character as a legendary dancer is something we will expect and the way AL Vijay has presented it is not going to give you that thrill. Even Akshat Singh is a famous dancer. And everything in the script looks so easy to guess. To make it slightly duller, there is an accident sequence which results in an explosion and nobody seems to be interested in thinking about the people who might have died in that accident. The music does help this dance-driven movie to a good extent. Nirav Shah’s cinematography is also fine. The dance we see in the movie is indeed good. But I expected something that could be called as mind-blowing in a movie about dance.

What happens in the climax of Lakshmi isn’t a great movie moment. But whatever that happens up to that point is so sluggish and dull that you eventually end up liking the sentimental climax where the good and bad unites under the shade of dance.

Rating: 2/5