Natpe Thunai - A simplistic sports drama that plays to the gallery!

Bharth Vijayakumar

There are two ways to look at a film like Natpe Thunai. If you take cinema as an art form seriously, then you might wonder if this is a film that gives craft its due importance. But then, this is also a film from makers who seem to know what exactly they are doing and whom are they catering to. Shrewdness is the word that comes to mind.

Natpe Thunai follows the regular sports drama template. But it keeps the emotions in check. While it treads the serious territory of politics in sports, it wants to keep things light as well. So we have a film that has a DNA very similar to Meesaya Murukku but adds sports and politics into the mix. A lot of dialogues act as references to our current political scenario. Karu Palaniappan playing the corrupt politician is the one who plays the messenger to the audience. He certainly has a presence and it comes across in the film but like all other actors in the film there is no real sense of someone playing a character as a part of a story. The film itself operates in this mode. Giving temporary highs at regular intervals seems to be the mantra.

While there are dialogues about friendship to convince us about the title, we never really feel any bond at any point of time. So everything that works in the film is like a catchy whatsapp forward or an enjoyable meme and it is left upto you - whether a collection of these is enough to satisfy you or not. In social media language, this is a film that is probably targetted at the 2K kids. You cannot pass a judgement as such but merely casting well known faces from social media might be the first step. But hope that in future films we get to see these actors being properly utilized rather than for mere amusement because of their popularity from elsewhere. I really hoped the comedy was better.

The songs pretty much look like made for an album rather than for a film about sports but as said earlier these aren't missteps but purposefully intended ploys.

Bottomline

A film that should work with its target audience. While you can give it to the team for being shrewd and playing within limitations, you also hope that a little more intent or effort can possibly produce more enjoyable and well rounded films.

Rating : 2.75/5