Thandavam

After some above average and excellent emotionally driven movies like Kireedam, Madras Pattanam and Deivathirumakal director A L Vijay tries his hand in making an action thriller. Even though he is fully supported by a committed actor like Vikram, the movie is a tiring and largely boring watch. A screenplay that is totally cluttered and the lack of freshness of theme and treatment makes this movie a bizarre one.

The story is about the guy Shivakumar, a top level RAW agent and how his life takes a total turn around due to an investigation about a missing flaw chart that has high importance in national security. How he fights back against the dark minds, how he takes revenge for his loved ones death, how he tackles his blindness etc are the elements of this movie.

Well, the plot itself has a cliché revenge feel to it. Like many other recent Tamil movies (Dhaam Dhoom for instance) this one also tries to make the story highly complicated or large scale whereas the actual plot is silly and predictable. The treatment of the screenplay has similarity with films like Gajini and the theme of terrorism is not creating any interest these days. The only portion that was enjoyable in the movie was the scenes involving Vikram and Anushka. Their charming on screen chemistry even manages to overcome or hide the flaws of the screenplay.

On screen, Vikram manages to pull off another impressive performance. Vikram knows to challenge himself as an actor but when it comes to selection of scripts he is too bad. Anushka is also pleasing with her Doctor/Wife avatar. I don’t know why Amy Jackson was included in the cast. Her role has literally no relevance in the movie. Santhanam is just there for the fun. Veteran actor Nassar did his part neatly. Nice portrayal of an important character by Jagathpathi Babu.

Well, A L Vijay manages to give a different feel to the movie. But his screenplay is totally cluttered and loosely bound. There is no smoothness in the flow of the narrative. No charming dialogs to keep in mind. The placing of songs was really awkward. GV Prakash’s 25^th outing is a descent one. Cinematography is impressive. The VFX also was kind of satisfying.

For a run time of around two hours and 45 minutes, this A L Vijay movie is a test of patience. With very few impressive fight sequences the movie won’t even please you in a pure commercial sense also. Acknowledging some technical standards and a beautiful onscreen chem. of Anushka and Vikram I am giving a 2/5 for this movie. It’s a dragging experience.