Movie Review – Cobra

Blasphemy!

If there was an award for choosing disastrous script, then Vikram would win it every single year. If there was an award for honesty in acting even in that disastrous script, Vikram would win even that. This film was again an example of such ridiculousness. Guess directors who want to take rest, earn big bucks and travel onsite for the film would have to do just one thing, imagine few getups and narrate the script to Vikram, rest all he’d take care. Even the directors who had fool proof record would do something like that to him. Every movie other than ‘Rajapattai’ was a hit by Suseenthiran. Same for Shankar and same here for Ajay Gnanamuthu. If a biopic would be made of an actor, of how great he could’ve been but couldn’t be, Vikram would fit right in. Something he himself can act.

The first half of ‘Cobra’ was utter rubbish. It’s a disgrace to even discuss it. Of his entire career, this was the only part of film where he doesn’t get to “act”. Even in a highly ridiculous ‘Kanthaswamy’ he’d have acted well in those horrible scenes. But here it was impossible to even sit through the movie. It was the first movie which totally didn’t work. Even ‘Rajapattai’ had few comic scenes, few which looked like comedy and certain massy scenes which would have got great applause if it had appeared in a Vijay or Ajith movie. Fights, needless to say were impressive. But in the first half of ‘Cobra’ even that was not good.

The director looked like he was badly inspired by Nolan, otherwise he wouldn’t have been able to make a movie this bad. Sci-fi or to be specific, a Nolan genre is not an easy nut to crack. Yes, the geeks love Nolan for the intricacies but as laymen, it’d work even without knowing anything. That’s how good he’s at his craft. That shows his sincerity. Not like here where a man is showed a genius just through few muted dialogues. Judith Samson (Meenakshi Govindarajan) was Ariadne (Ellet Page) whose role was to admire the killer for his math skill. But if you would point to the audience, why even to the director to tell about one complex math he did to do the killing, they couldn’t, and that’s how shallow the script was. The titular explanation of ‘Cobra’ by her was the second worst in Vikram’s career, the first being ‘Bheemaa’. Of the three actress, Meenakshi Govindarajan was the one who looked pretty and looked like someone who had the potential to actually nail a character like Ariadne but with such a horrible story, even Manorama during her peak days couldn’t have evoked any interest in the character.

After a numbing experience, around the interval there was a twist that at least evoked some curiosity. The second half had a solid story about twins. We don’t really know why their mother was in jail, but that’s okay, the meet up of the characters was well made and the action sequence in rain was shot well. The umbrella scene where Vikram stands on top and before the fight where he ties his hair were the scenes which worked but the audience were too tired before those scenes because the entire first half was buffoonery.

The story was about twin brothers, rivalry and chivalry between them. When the movie ended it was still not clear as to who was who, which was actually nice, audience were mumbling with each other. If it had happened for an English movie, it would have been appreciated but it’s not the mistake of audience. You got to have a solid plot to make such a movie, not just fool around with makeup.

The investigation scene should have worked like the ‘Anniyan’ scene but again it didn’t due to shoddy screenplay of first half. Climax was really good, the thinking of killing all Vikram’s imaginary characters along with him in such a serious way had to be appreciated. If someone like Vignesh Shivan had done that scene it’d have come out terrific. But here, audience were already exhausted to appreciate anything.

The flashback sequence, fight between brothers were all lame and as my friend pointed out, thankfully he didn’t reduce weight to act as a college student. But how well had he dubbed! Srinidhi Shetty actually looked hot than her previous outings, especially in “Thumbi Thullal” song. Only place in the entire movie where Vikram looked happy. Mirnalini Ravi was such a waste. Rahman’s music too was wasted here. Few of the BGMs were terrific which could’ve done a world of good to other normal masala flicks. Overall, yet another disaster.

Movie Review – K.G.F: Chapter 1 and Chapter 2

Noise or Music?

‘KGF’ is a problematic film. I watched the first part in TV with not so much concentration and the film’s trajectory swings here and there like mood swings of an irritable person. I couldn’t completely enjoy it like a guilty pleasure as well as couldn’t completely set it aside as a not-my-type-of film. It was here and there and that was the biggest problem. I saw myself applauding for few scenes and hating some. Both were in fact okay but together it didn’t piece together and ends up as a film too long trying to express what it was trying to express. That’s my I waited and watched the first part again before watching the second part to come to a conclusion…

We’re in good days that each film industry has given a big blockbuster extravaganza. It’s not by luck it has become so but it was written so and marketed that way as well. So comparisons were bound to happen with ‘Bahubali’ 1 and 2. That’s where the problem lies, ‘KGF’ couldn’t cope up with it, but the director Prashanth Neel would have written the film before the release of Bahubali or may be in parallel with it. So even though it has similar sentiments like being a people’s champion, mother sentiment, respecting women etc. ‘KGF’ progresses in its own way.

The film was an out and out Rocky (Yash) show and other characters, both positive and negative were just commentators enhancing his macho image. The confusing thing here was, watching it dubbed in Tamil, it was working for large extent, and I was constantly confused how and why it was working. Of course, many dialogues by now have taken a comic template or in memes but it’s more so because it impacted for that sentiment in the movie. Wish I could have just enjoyed and not be confused or just hated it. The confusion part was confusing me, just like the screenplay of the movie.

The film was told through Anand Ingalagi (Anant Nag) in part one and son of him, Vijayendra Ingalagi (Prakash Raj) in part two. Both, film’s narrative wise as well as narrators’ wise, Part 2 was much better as it was clear. In Part one, scenes appear out of blue, that was contributed to Anand’s old age. Wish those scenes has a clearer explanation in part two but that wasn’t to happen. Wonder whether it should be appreciated as director’s cleverness or a cheap trick. Ther was no dearth of built up so to infuse scenes which didn’t fit to the screenplay was not really necessary. Anand overdoes in the first part. It was as if Prashanth had shot those scenes and didn’t find the right tool to place it in the film, so he fitted it somehow.

The films biggest problem and the most irritating character was Reena Desai (Srinidhi Shetty) who was given western dress in part one and traditional dress in part two and that was it. There was nothing interesting about her characterization otherwise. It was a movie which had caricatures as characters, so why not resort to make it an entirely guy movie. Rocky was having a hard time in song sequences; he was too macho even for an item number where he was not expected to express any love emotion. So, needless to say, the love track was just debacle. Reena not only looks confused about her emotion but makes us confused too as to what her character was trying to prove.

The mother sentiment, in short, works but again it comes out at needless times and spoils the flow of the film and changes the mood of the film suddenly. It was like two different films yet works for some weird reason. Wish it had been a complete guilty pleasure like an ‘Expendables’ or a ‘Death Race’ with men and machismo but it tries to do a sentiment film in the midst of that and tries to infuse values sometime and leaves our audience dazed and confused.

Even with respect to the titular character, ‘Rocky’ it was not clear whether why he was getting so much love. He was the same man who lets a couple of slaves being killed Garuda (Ramachandra Raju) which I found no logic to, apart from giving a cinematic high for climax. He who doesn’t feel bad initially about slaves being killed suddenly gets angry for a blind man about to be killed. The reason? Not sure. So, his love towards him and people’s love towards him were both problematic and confusing. I guess it’s a film which couldn’t be analyzed. Like how no one can say why they like certain people, how certain actors become famous, ‘KGF’ should be left alone.

Movie Review – K.G.F: Chapter 1

Maverick Mayhem

Even though I missed it in theatres I still watched the movie amidst a lot of hype. The movie is a dream for any star. Note carefully, any star, not any actor. But to be a star requires a lot of charisma. It wouldn’t work on just anyone. And not everyone can become a star just by being in the film. Yash had that screen presence. Being someone who has fairly any knowledge about Kannada cinema, it still gave me goosebumps, that too in Tamil, wonder how it’d have been for Kannada people who had known the language and known Yash. And how much it’d have meant for Yash fans. Just the thought of it is so unimaginable.

It’s a type of film which Vikram would have been looking for, looking for in his entire life. I actually feel like making a film on Vikram on how he wanted to choose an elusive script till the end of his life and finally doesn’t get it. I guess that would be his ‘Raging Bull’. Funny fellow.

The fact that it appealed even as a Tamil movie shows the sincerity in translation. The words, poems and more importantly punch dialogues were built up superbly. Even though the number of slowmos and build up music gets overboard after a point. It still adds value to the film and doesn’t end up like a Simbu film where there are introduction shots in every single scene. In that way the director had succeeded. It’s only through his firm belief that a film like this had been made. Even if he had had an iota of doubt, it’d have got transformed in the film and could have spoilt.

The movie minces no words. Its heroism right from the start. If you read the story on paper it’s a typical MGR film. That too the film happens during 70s so it’s a perfect MGR film. But with the graphics, slowmos and lighting it looks more present. But in a way it spoils the film too. The action sequences could have been definitely better. We hardly see Yash in anything. It’s like seeing Dinosaurs in Jurassic Park. You get to see only part of him, thanks to the lighting. It’s okay if it had been used that way once. But being too clever in the action sequences got very much evident. He knows that he can’t fully light up a fighting scene because he can’t afford to make it look great then.

The villains are just a way bit too much. They’re like video game villains, one after another in different get up. The shock value for each of the villain remains the same. After a point it becomes overwhelming as the same template was used. It’s only a richer way of introducing villains but at ground level its same as how Perarasu does in introducing Pattasu Balu. In spite of it, the villains did a fair job in being villains. The only bad casting seemed to be the heroine who looked so out of place as someone from the outside world who had jumped into the film. You need someone like a Deepika Padukone or Anushka Sharma to be a femme fatale. Here Srinidhi Shetty was not fatal but just a causality. It’s like being the only human in ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit’. She looked like the only mortal in the world of caricatures. Who would have guessed that being mortal would be such a negative trait?

The film has a number of great moments but to know the story one has to keenly hear. Read again, hear and not see. That’s a big mistake. Narration should be a style but a necessity. Here the story is conveyed only through narration because Rocky (Yash) is so busy fighting, he doesn’t have time to talk. The narration overlaps a number of times and so is the storyline. Even if it was intentional, it disrupts the viewers. It’s not made with any formula. Just random throwing here and there and cut horribly wrong. It’d have easily been given a more traditional approach and made it look great. This needless experimentation spoils the joy of viewers. Instead of enjoying the film we’re made to think who’s who.

In spite of all this, the film still works and makes me very eager to watch the second part in theatres (if we’re alive by then, that is) because of the power. Like Rocky realizes. KGF is a powerful film. Like I’ve stated, its mayhem but still its maverick. Superbly made. Makes you feel as if you’re in theme park with thrilling rides back to back and there is no one to stop. Yash’s presence is terrific, except for that one drunk scene with the heroine, all other scenes he was awesome. Even the kid who had acted as rocky had done a fair job. The thrill remains.

This might not be a perfect film. This might not be a Bahubali, yet. Still we have one more part to arrive. Remember that Bahubali became a Bahubali only after Part 2 so I have high confidence that it’d good. Credit has to be given to Prashanth Neel for visualizing this larger than life story and executing it properly. This might not be perfect but it really could be a beginning.