Kannai Nambathey Review

PUBLISHED DATE : 17/Mar/2023

Kannai Nambathey Review

Kannai Nambathey Review 

Ashwin Ram


 

Kannai Nambathey is a suspense thriller with an ensemble star cast of Udhayanidhi Stalin, Prasanna, Srikanth, Bhoomika Chawla and Aathmika playing the lead roles. It is directed by Mu.Maran of Iravukku Aayiram Kangal fame.


Premise: Udhayanidhi Stalin decides to help Bhoomika who is not in a stable condition to drive her car. His roommate Prasanna screws up with her and she dies. Now, both the men are in deep trouble and badly want to come out of the situation.


Writing/ Direction:  The narrative decision could have been different, revealing a part of the incident that happened in the crime scene at the beginning itself brings down the suspense factor, if not for that, the flow would appeal more. The mystery behind Bhoomika’s character was held back for too long that the twist created less impact than its potential. There are plenty of shortcomings like verbal cringe moments at places, the lack of nativity in presentation, convenient writing at a bunch of places to match the co-incidences, creating comfortable character behaviours which will easily drive forward the plot. There are plenty of logic loopholes like effortlessly the characters are able to access random roadside CCTV cameras, purposefully maintaining empty roads so that the crimes won’t be noticed, etc. Despite the shortcomings, it has come out as a watchable flick with measured thrilling elements every now and then. The central crime is very strong, in fact an unheard topic and that’s a big win considering the medical backdrop. The characters have convincing objectives, enough backstory to drive the flow without boring much and all the incidents are impressively knit together. The tease idea at the end has a solid commercial value but it fails to deliver the punch.


Performances: Udhayanidhi Stalin sticks to his comfort zone where he doesn’t really have to perform and be expressive. Prasanna shockingly fails to provide an earnest performance which he generally carries, especially his dialogue delivery is a complete bummer with no dynamic modulations. Srikanth and Bhoomika are decent in their meaty roles, the Roja Koottam pair get more space towards the end. Aathmika has a small link to the core plot but the fun fact is that she even goes to a mortuary with full blowing makeup. Sathish as usual utters some silly counters in the name of jokes, man goes missing after a point and never returns till the very end.


Technicalities: Though the director’s previous film had a mixed bag content, Sam.C.S’ score packed it up decently. Here Siddhu Kumar is the music composer and his work is meh throughout with random drum-kind instruments used which adds zero value. Jalandhar Vasan’s camera work is neat, he has captured plenty of night sequences well with measured lighting. San Lokesh’s editing could have been tighter, probably by reducing a couple of rotative and repetitive sequences. Sound mixing is very bad as the levels are not in balance. Lip sync is a major issue which exists all over the film.


Bottomline


 

Quite predictable and doesn’t have the directorial finesse which is evident in a bunch of places. Still a passable mystery outing in which something or the other is constantly happening that is interesting to an extent.


Kannai Nambathey - Harmless Thriller!

Rating - 2.75/ 5


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