Movie Review – Sarvam Thaala Mayam

A rollicking start to a rock bottom end

Some time back, there was a topic doing rounds, called a ‘great first half and silly second half films’. This film fits to tee to that description. I was never interested in this movie at first place. G V Prakash in his regular shabby avatar was a no brainer to avoid the film in spite of having Rahman in music department and Rajiv Menon directing the film. In fact, the posters I thought was a parody but thanks to a recommendation by dear friend, I thought of watching the film and ended up being pleasantly surprised.

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The story is about a young Peter Johnson (G. V. Prakash Kumar), a crazy Vijay fan, who plays music during new releases of Vijay, who doesn’t have much ambition in life. During one chance encounter he goes to deliver mridangam to Vembhu Iyer (Nedumudi Venu) at which times he gets awed by his playing, which makes him want to master the art of mridangam. Being a regular local drums player, he has fast hands and that makes Vembhu Iyer notice him but he doesn’t admit him as his disciple immediately. After a lot of effort Peter gains the trust of Vembhu Iyer.

Even though it feels like a regular rag to riches story, the making is so organic and lovable. We get so attached to the character so that we don’t want him to fail. Also, the friendship angle between Peter and Nandhu/Nandhagopal (Sumesh), another disciple who learns along with him, was nice because his introduction was a curious one where Vembhu Iyer rejects the proposal of shaking hands citing that someone injured his hand. What we think of attitude is actually his respect for art. I have a firsthand experience of it because a guitar teacher whom I know met with an accident while going in bike and injured his finger so he never uses bike but only car. He may minimize expense in other things but would never take a bike instead of car. So, what I thought would be gentle insult turned out the other way around when Nandhu too joins his class and both Peter and Nandhu strike a friendship. Throughout this phase, there was no direct mention of cast or creed, the music united everyone, which was beautiful to watch. Till now it had all the ingredients of a breezy Rajiv Menon film, like that of ‘Kandukondain Kandukondain’ and I thought the film was going to proceed in the same vein but from the interval juncture things went awry.

Nandhu getting wooed by Anjana (Dhivyadharshini) to enter into a reality show where Peter gets caught instead of him and eventually losing the trust of Vembhu Iyer and injuring his finger was nice and tense. But the second half was a total disaster. He who loses everyone starts on a road trip to learn music and title song appears for it. It was as silly as it could get. Ideally that should have been the most inspiring part of the story but the directors nowadays who take travel for granted make these irritating montages and make people cringe for these songs.

The second half went wayward because the reason for Vembhu Iyer to follow the music program and wanting to prove the world that he’s the best looked silly beyond words. Even though his wife’s argument is valid and the scene was lovely, it doesn’t make someone with the stature of Vembhu Iyer to bow down so easily. She was terrific throughout the movie even though she didn’t have any dialogue. The second half still had its moments. The above scene was one, the scene in car with Vedaraman (Sikkil Gurucharan) was a lovely one. Something on the lines of ‘Uttama Villain’ car scene with Andrea. Even the scene where the judges talk outside the scoring avenue was good but altogether it wasn’t convincing in any way. Plus, when the movie ends as if its all for a silly TV program, it was disappointing to the core.

All in all, it was a really good attempt. They had tried something new. But the way it started, it looked as if it was due for something big but instead ends like a reality show cat fight. The movie was definitely nice but I thought by the end I’d like be liking it much more.