Aranmanai 4 Review - A Satisfying Outing for its Target Audience!

Ashwin Ram

Aranmanai 4 is the fourth installment in director Sundar.C’s horror-comedy franchise. Tamannaah Bhatia and Raashi Khanna play the female leads alongside the filmmaker. Hip hop Tamizha has scored the music for the movie.

 
Premise:
Sundar.C and Tamannaah are siblings who admire each other, but were separated in a family issue. Series of supernatural events happen in Tamannaah’s place in which she is found dead. Sundar.C digs deep about the mysterious situation which unravels the remaining story.

Writing/ Direction:
The ghost has a fine reasoning which sets the base neatly, it is a breather that the central idea is not in the usual revenge zone. Three elements drive the screenplay, horror, comedy and the drama. The core sibling emotion works well as their bonding is established well and there is enough weightage in the crisp intercut that sets the mood right. But on the flip side, Tamannaah’s murder scene which is showcased in a detailed manner is just minimally sentimental, mainly because the sequence takes an overly long screen-time to explain what the audience already knew. The comedies are a mixed bag, Yogi Babu, VTV Ganesh and Kovai Sarala deal with the department for the most part in which Kovai Sarada’s exaggerated jokes click and offer laughter. The men are boring during the slapstick humor portions, quite funny with the dialogue counters especially in the Sundar.C’s trademark final act. But there are plenty of lengthy comedy stretches which are irrelevant to the subject and just there to fill the spot. Motta Rajendran appears in a cameo scene and the entire sequence is wholly unnecessary. The intended jump scare moments land flat as they are deteriorated by the interruptions of the comedy artists, yet the film manages to hold the thrills to an extent that the story is always on the focus point. The movie ends on an energetic note because of the climax Amman song and the sexy item number ‘Achacho’ during the rolling credits.

Performances:
Tamannaah plays a key role in which she delivers a powerful performance, less screen space yet she provides the much-needed impact. Raashi Khanna carries herself with a shining presence, doesn’t impress much with acting as there is no big scope for her. Kovai Sarala holds the show well from the humor front, while Yogi Babu and VTV Ganesh rarely entertain. Superb role for KGF Garuda and he has played it with a strong conviction. Sundar.C leads the pack neatly by delivering what is exactly required for the film, however he struggles during the stunt sequences and his dupe takes the front seat. Simran and Khushboo strike big with their fierce dance in the climax Amman song.

Technicalities:
This is by far the best film in the franchise from a technical perspective. Cinematography is solid, the camera angles have sufficient disturbance in the frames to give that immense experience. The songs are average, fortunately Hip hop Tamizha’s background score adds a lot of value for even some underwhelming sequences to be appealing on-screen. Decent editing overall by neatly inserting transitions between one scene and the next, however a few old style comedy sequences could have been chopped to save some time. Exorbitant usage of VFX, the output quality is better than the predecessors, still certain areas need improvement.

Bottomline

Writing is basic, but the film is engaging to an extent as Sundar.C packages it with a mix of comedies, emotions and thrills. Also, it’s a step-up for the franchise in terms of technicalities.

Rating - 2.75/ 5