LEADER Review - Mediocre writing aside, a harmless commercial outing

Ashwin Ram

Writing/ Direction: Kudos to director Durai Senthilkumar for grooming Legend Saravanan and presenting him as a hero material. The approach is a full-length commercial flick, he has placed some exciting mass moments in the flow but missed out on detailing the script. Important aspects like the villain’s motive and the hero’s secret missions are bluntly conveyed without adding depth in writing. It affects by being the main reason for emotions to fall flat and the sentiment dialogues appearing to be melodramatic. There are a few one-line punches quoting to the hero’s real life, they comfortably work on a community watch. The template is more like a Lokesh Kanagaraj film, with the harbour backdrop, it easily reminds us of Coolie. Certain small mass moments have been worked out well, utilising the joint family angle of Shaam to crack a case. Plus there are plenty of twisted stretches in the narration, some feel like force-fits, but there are a handful of twists within a bunch of scenes to make it interesting. Interval block looks lavish indeed with a quality VFX shot, slow-motion walk, etc… but it does not reveal anything specific to provide the goosebumps factor. The antagonist’s role is too single dimensional and does some old-school traits to prove the bad guy image, yet some subtexts click. A film that has nothing new to offer, still manages to hold to a decent extent till the interval, the lengthy flashback in the latter fails to land with underwhelming emotions, brisks up towards the finale and ends well.

Performances: Unlike Legend Saravanan’s first movie, he looks like a human here, good work by his makeup team. But he struggles to express, however the stone-face does not fall on the mockery side this time. His shortcomings are bettered by giving good importance to supporting characters like Andrea Jeremiah and Shaam, they deliver what is exactly required without disturbing the commercial mood. Lal is the chief who builds up the hero’s image by narrating his backstory, job done fine. Despite having involvement in the subject, dummy role for Payal Rajput, also her acting is lacklustre. Santhosh Prathap does a solid job with different looksets, sadly his character needs much better writing for him to be a challenging villain.

Technicalities: The technical crew have worked as the film’s pillar of strength for the satisfying output. Quality camera work that is required to present a film in the commercial space is wisely done, the visuals are pleasing including the VFX, except some disturbing AI/ animation insert shots. Pradeep E. Raghav yet again proves he is a champ, major credits goes to him for restricting the runtime and delivering it as a racy package, with some hiccups in the form of the flashback. The rehash of Lord Murugar song is fun, otherwise a dull work by Ghibran in terms of album. His background score is somewhat better, but still not enough. For a poor product like ‘The Legend’, Harris Jayaraj managed to raise the bar. The action sequences look stylish, but the ones involving the hero are only attempts to prove to us that he seems to be fighting.

Verdict: Applause to Durai Senthilkumar for presenting Legend Saravanan as a dignified hero. The film does work as stretches, with the first half being watchable and an exciting finale, racy editing makes us forget the drawbacks of the melodramatic flashback and writing mediocrity.

LEADER - Despite its mediocre writing and melodramatic stretches, LEADER manages to stay afloat as a harmless commercial entertainer.

Rating - 2.5/ 5.