Kathakali - An Interesting Dance!!!
Bharath Vijayakumar
Though every hero who has walked the action path sometime in his career would have followed this template you are really tempted to call it the 'Vishal' genre now. Is it because he does it more frequently or is it because he does it better than the others? This discussion can be for some other time. Moving on to Kathakali. Yes this film too is on a familiar terrain but Pandiraj has thrown in a thriller angle to transcend the boundaries of a typical actioner.
Plot:
A don whose nemeses outnumber the count of action films that Vishal has done is bumped off. It naturally becomes difficult to decipher the man behind this. Fingers point to Vishal and he has to get out of this mess.
Cast:
Vishal does his routine but truth be said he looks the part in these films. Catherine has a nice little part in the film and though her difficulty in lip syncing is quite apparent she does a neat job.
It is a good ploy to rope in Karunas this time. His combo with Vishal has some fine moments in the initial hour. There is something very refined about the performance of Karunas in comedy these days. He is neither too subtle nor too loud.
Pandiraj:
Pandiraj does a lot of things right in his first action film. He has not changed the template but has surely reworked a few things and kept things nice and tight. The initial hour involving the love track might seem a commercial compromise but it actually does play a part in the proceedings and impacts the way you see things and keep guessing the killer in the later half.The decision to keep the running time to just over 2 hours is again right on the money. This does not seem a one off as actually 3 out of the 4 releases this Pongal run at around this time. Looks like Tamil cinema has finally warmed up to keeping the focus only on the plot. But despite this the makers find time to nudge in an opening song about friendship. You can definitely do this if the song is extremely catchy. But if it is a so-so then it really defeats any purpose that it could have.
The film successfully has you going back and forth in your choice of the killer but at a point in the film these twists keep coming so often that you wonder whether you have lost interest in finding 'Mr.X'. The final act is a clincher though and Pandiraj does have the last laugh. There are not many loose ends but some questions remain. What kept Vishal out from returning to India for the death of his mother during his time in the US? The question becomes more pertinent after you see the climax unfold as even the idea of saving money that could have been the reason makes no sense.This apart Pandiraj has got almost everything right. Even Vishal's artificial slang at the beginning that has you cringing becomes justified later in a comical act with Catherine.
Hip Hop Thamizha's score brings a nice little dimension to the film. The build up to heroism and the henchmen taking turns to get beaten to pulp does not hurt you much this time as they are kept short and there is something nice about the BGM in these scenes with the familiar Chenda beats making more impact with the sound level kept at an optimum.
Bottomline:
With a template action film that is actually plot driven Pandiraj delivers a winner.
Rating- 3/5