A Subliminal Jigarthanda from Karthik Subburaj

                   This is not a review and hence watching the movie before continuing reading this is highly recommended. What makes the premise of this movie a herculean challenge is the fact that this is not a unknown path but was one that was tried umpteen times with little or no success (Kandukondain Kandukondain, Vellithirai to name a few). Karthik Subburaj managed to win over it with such elegance that no one would care to say that he did that by chance but was destined to do that right from the time this idea dawned on him. All said and done in various reviews about the numerous deftness of his craftsmanship, it is quite obvious that certain aspects are privy to only this man (Karthi Subburaj) and those being all the subliminal stuff he has added and still guffawing at innocent digestion of it by the audience & dimwit industry personnel. Here's a little compilation of my attempt to pick his brain on the subliminal yet hard hitting messages.

• #7 - For those who believed that this was Karthik Subburaj's story or its exaggerated fictional anecdote then you are wrong. Because the various characters splurged across the entire 3 hour length are not those who happened to be there in his story but a clear casting after a detailed profiling of handpicked bunch of real people based on the experiences from the lives of many struggling directors (to be).
• #6 - Life's full of distractions & pessimism (Lakshmi Menon, Karunakaran) when you work towards your ultimate goal, those who steer unfazed reap its clear benefits.
• #5 - Most of you would have noticed the gangster part, if you were wondering where the musical part was, watch again! Close your eyes and listen to the attitude in background scores. Musicals doesn't necessarily need to have the 'song' segments or have music as a part of storyline & screenplay.
• #4 - The cinematic success of Bobby Simha as Azuguni Kumar is a sounding proof that many a time in life what you think as your strength (fear inducing, thick skinned, killer) is not really the ones that gives you the accolades or takes you places but your talents though absolutely unnoticed or in this example hated by you, gives that soul soothing everything that you have been searching your entire life. You need to make peace with your malign mind and start believing on what others enjoy about you instead.
• #3 - Sangili Murugan's late night roadside advice is a mere hallucination when it comes to real life, its just you and no one else who has to back yourself.
• #2 - Remember the three monkeys & a gangster boss with the protagonist's attempt to crack the story? The analogy being cracking the gangster boss's story being achieving success in films via Booze friendships, Sleaze relationships & Plagiarized story. A mix of one or all of these has been the traditional pathways while true achievers steer clear of all these either by chance or by choice.
• #1 - The last ten minutes or so depicts that the practical world is very much accomodative, it has the space for the wide spectra of directors | actors how much ever good | bad they are.

Onaayum Aattukkuttiyum Review

    It's been quite a long time since a non-horror thriller that has kept me at the edge of my seat till the last frame and Mysskin's this masterpiece is one such. His previous Mugamoodi could just be officially deemed as his childish fiddling. There are however quite a lot of shades that we have seen in his past movies have gone notches higher and better in this outing!

• The first resemblance I would awe about being his affinity for 'under the yellow street lights' shots for many of the scenes.
• The array of supporting characters leave a mark on our minds on par with the leading ones.
• The brutality of murders of public and police akin gives no time for remorse due to a. the sheer number of such killings & b. the pace at which the screenplay takes us forward to make us lean towards what's next instead.
• Sri is an actor of sheer class and a blessed soul for adding another feather to his cap by his performance oriented ஆட்டுக்குட்டி (Goat) role.
• Mysskin's brilliance in the detailing of his capacity of being an ace hit-man aka  ஓநாய் (Wolf) till the last frame shows one of the greater depths of characterization in recent times of Tamil Cinema.
• There are a lot of subtle yet purposeful references to theism / atheism depending on ones affinity to either.
• The cinematography is stunning throughout and my favorite were repetitive frames with police convoy flash-lights giving a bokeh effect.
• Yet again genius is an understatement for Ilayaraja's background score for this movie and one just needs to get drenched in it DOT
• The one place where the audience lost their way was Mysskin's cemetery narration, which worked for me though!

Bottomline:

       Mysskin is en-route becoming a lone wolf amidst a large pack of bears, tigers & baboons of cinema!

The Lunch Box Review

 

           There are times where the movies are enjoyed just because the popcorn turns out to have extra butter. There are a few other times where the movie has a lot of food for thought that one never gets hungry down under. The Lunch Box truly befits the latter. For a Hindi illiterate person this was my first Hindi movie in a theater in more than a decade and must admit that the trailer won me over in first place.

• Firstly, one must appreciate the director for having showcased a six sigma organization's THAT ONE fault in all of a million transactions. 
• Secondly, reality neither has a specific hero introduction and nor typically a climax sequence and that is precisely what you can expect.
• This movie is about relationships and its issues, of those with some grey on their heads.
• A non-cliche at-home wife, who handles emotional blows with believable contemplations and level headed approach.
• A story having those who started as orphans to those who became orphans.
• Characters are cast sparingly and all that is unnecessary has been trimmed down including one who does not a voice as well as a voice which did not need a face.
• Lastly, the movie closes and not ends in a sense leaving it wide open for the audience to contemplate!

Bottomline:

      It's a three course carrier meal in a fine dining experience sans the need for extra spice or the digestive mouth-fresheners!

Thanga Meengal Review

    
              The expectations were that this would be a kind of genre already explored in 'Abhiyum Naanum'.  This movie did that precisely just we have to assume that Prakash Raj was poor and Trisha never grew up! 

The PROs

• The story line is the biggest plus for the movie and highly needed for this 'lost-track-of-what-education-really-is' society.
• The ensemble cast of fresh faces execute with deftness & conviction.
• The childish dialogues or conversations that gets nostalgic (at least for some).
• The background score is laudable, great to see Yuvan befitting the Maestro's calibre for once.
• The visuals are breathtaking & 'Anandha Yaazhai' is a must watch not-be-missed song.

The CONs

• The protagonist seems to be just another version of Kattradhu Thamizh Jeeva, right from looks to mannerism and character, unless it is a deliberate decision. 
• The second half of the movie was quite a stretch with respect to the screenplay and I had to resort to a time check.

Bottomline:

      The movie is a hard nail on the head & serves as a wake up call for those who really watches the movie to take back in their lives than just being just another movie of entertainment value.

Ship of Theseus Review

 First things first, this movie is a must watch and it should be done at the earliest, for two reasons

1. The movie is a brilliant piece of work.
2. It runs only a few shows in Satyam Cinemas, in the whole of Chennai.

  Now coming to the other details, its better for the 'mass crowd' to know what this movie is all about.

• This movie has no popular or even known names in its crew except for a dash of Kiran Rao reference.
• There are no cinematic fights.
• There are no songs.
• Most of the time there is no background score.
• This is not a cinematographic visual treat.
• The languages spoken by characters include Arabic, Sanskrit & Swedish and of course Hindi & mostly English.
• There are sub titles in English. 
• There are no duets or dream sequences.
• There are no flashbacks too.

Also there are certain other things which might interest a few or maybe add on to the previous list for some others.

• The movie is so real that one can venture out to find scores of such people | stories in real world.
• One will realize that vision does not necessarily have to result in glee for the blind.
• One waging a war against cruelty cannot survive to win the war without endorsing it some point if their life is at stake.
•  Life's fulfillment is just not about money or one's own self but something subtler and yet larger than life. 

 This movie has a lot of not-to-be-missed conversations that convey quite a number of hard this-is-how-one-has-to-be facts in different ways.

• The ones between Aliya Kamal & Vinay has a lot of subtle and yet valuable relationship related takeaways. 
• All of those conversations between Maitreya & Charvaka are absolute delight to listen to with each of it touching the highs of logic to philosophy and even spirituality.
• Lastly the single conversation between Navin Parnami and his grandma is soul stirring that changes purpose of the character of Navin altogether thereafter.

Bottomline

I would like to quote Anand Gandhi on this - "The three short stories evolved to fill in the three corners of the classical Indian trinity of Satyam-Shivam-Sunderam (The pursuit of truth, the pursuit of righteousness and the pursuit of beauty)" and the movie indeed serves an answer to the famous paradox.

Mariyaan Review

    Mariyaan (Tamil: மரியான் Mariyāņ; English: The Immortal) just as a title & poster gives the first set of clues about the movie.

• The hero is immortal ( to differ from other hero immortal movies tamil movies, guess they have titled it here explicitly).
• Since its a name less heard off its either the hero's name or he would be fondly called so.

Next the tech-crew of the movie created another palpable expectation

• Bharat Bala of Vande Mataram fame is the debut director of the movie.
• No doubt A.R Rahman being the music director for the movie, after many years of having worked with Bharat Bala.

For this script Bharat Bala wouldn't have needed to break his head on who the protagonist is but just decide when the dates of Dhanush are available because

• The script demanded a non-heroic commoner-like established actor.
• Dhanush has already pulled off umpteen such movies with ease and he is the safest bet for this.

Why the hero from a poor coastal village?

• Pity on Dhanush's character has sold easily many a time before.
• We already have going abroad for meagre jobs, terrorism & coastal hamlets based standalone movies as well and two of those three combined ones too and hence to make one as a first of its kind the director seems to have chosen a coastal poor boy taking up a job abroad being kidnapped by foreign terrorists.

The hallucinations

• The movie had quite a lot of it like the hero's friend dreaming of hero and heroin hugging each other to hero eating non existent food.
• Each time the hero thinks of his girl, she comes and even performs a duet with the hero.
• We get the drift that the hero is inspired by his love for his girl however the heroin recurrence in the movie has really spoilt the flow and pace of the movie.

The uncommonly common hero

• As stated earlier, the hero is pictured as a common gutsy local guy. However even at times of captivity, the hero does not show any fatigue & dehydration to the extent any normal guy would have shown.
• The villain kills anyone but the hero only to get killed by the hero later, an outright tradition right from James Bond movies to Tamil movies.

The ever-b[l]inding LOVE

• Off all the people in the entire village, the dusky heroin only falls for the skinny hero cos that's what her love is destined to be.
• The conversation with heroin's father, who quotes 'For every achiever there should be a girl involved with him' sparks the love in hero's mind and he reciprocates his love and the heroin of course gleefully gears up for duets.

The Sudan terrorists & the kidnap fiasco

• The depiction in the movie could be termed as one of the most imaginative portrayal of terrorists in any movie seen before. 
• The highlight of it was the scene where the terrorists ask Dhanush to dance and he does a gig which sways between reality and his hallucination. I just wonder why the director clings to such unimaginable stereotypes.

The GREAT escape

• The hero pulls off a great escape without any sense of portrayal in the movie of how he figured out which way he was heading and how he survived without food and water especially for so many days together in a region of inhuman desert terrain.
• The Cheetah part is a must watch and no clue why its place in the movie is justified.

The climax

• The villain finds an almost dead Dhanush however still he does not kill him instantly (just like how he did to the other captives)  because he is the hero remember?
• So its a typical bashing of the villain followed by his death and what was surprising was the 'king of the ocean' who survived the harsh desert, lose out his fatigue and is washed off lying like a dead meat.
• The following five minutes showcases incidents which an English movie would have taken an entire movie to showcase.

Bottomline:

    In his quest for keeping the hero immortal (மரியான்) the director stabbed the audience so many times that they are either dead or seriously injured.

Settai Review

           When it comes to remake there are many good directors (read CON Review), however there are only a few with great talent because it only takes a great talent to make a sensational hit out of remaking a flop as well as making a fantastic flop out of a box office breaker & those who had seen or even heard of the original would know it!

Here's an attempt to reconstruct what (probably) went in the minds of the producers of this feature film.

1. Buy the rights of the original.
2. Check with Aamir Khan on his budget for producing the original and fix half of it or even less for the remake.
3. Also ask them if they still have the set they used for the original and preserve whatever is left of that and use it.
4. Make sure the movie is made in front of the eyes of the producers (hence shot in Mumbai).
5. Replace just the main cast of the original.
6. Assume that the Tamil audience are grown up 'kids' and henceforth remove the adult-content aspects ( a.k.a the reasons why the original was a resounding success). Its like remaking a Shakila movie and without her so that the movie would henceforth be a 'family entertainer' and of course the CBFC would silence certain mouthing here too.

Bottomline: 

      This movie could have reaped similar resounding success had it retained the selling point of the original. It ends up as a cheap 'adulterated' shitty (literally) movie with Santhanam bringing a little respite here and there.

Chennaiyil Oru Naal Review

                How often do we get to see a Tamil movie where every minute in the movie really counts? Well the last instance I remember seeing something similar was in Unnai Pol Oruvan.  Yet again a Tamil Cinema has bolted such a screenplay as a strong anchor. I must say the movie has lot of positives and a must watch even before I get to the details of what's hot and what's not.

What's HOT

• Firstly the ensemble cast, a great positive from an industry permanently tattooed with heroism and star studded one man shows. A little sad to note that this casting hasn't happened on an original script but only to an award winning remake.
• The movie has all the elements of making it a full course meal (hero, villain, politics, romance, betrayal, rich, poor et al) however the director cooks a perfect one course diet meal sans the unwanted fat, whatsoever.
• I don't know what's with Kollywood, off-late too many attempts (Pizza, Paradesi and this too) at a 2 hour running length however this movie is an example of it in a good way.
• I felt this movie is definitely NOT the kind of remakes where the Find & Replace-Cast alone technique (the one employed in Remake Ravi's movies) is employed.
• If the casting, script and pace of the movie were the three pillars then the fourth one definitely was the screenplay where the open ended threads in the various sub-plots does not leave us in doubts (unlike Paradesi) but gives all that is needed for us to close each of them ourselves mentally.
• Yet another purposeful yet subtle add on here being each of the three roadtrip characters belonging to different religions which in a way made me feel they are all not different and when there is a real need there is just one religion called mankind, just as how humans started!

Quite a few blips in this screenplay too.

What's NOT

• Understandable even the Sundara Pandian (Sarath Kumar) can lose track of his operation once (where the interval comes) but twice (where he calls off the operation, hastily)? I did not expect this from a top cop sitting in a control room with satellite gizmos and with known last point of contact but still unable to fathom the current coordinates of a speeding car. If it took a top cop to realize the car is 8Km ahead in its journey only after hearing from Sathyamoorthi, then I guess not just him but his entire team sitting at the control room are pathetic in their geography.
• Keeping the audience guessing and nail biting was a strong positive in this movie right from the start however it lost its way & literally caved-in in the last 15 minutes. There is a situation of shortage of time and detour was needed. Its announced that only one man can make it happen hassle free. Had that one person was kept under wraps until the end of the detour and revealed later would've sustained the guessing game till the end, which however did not happen & was lost. The Surya cameo in the start phase of it and the boring & not so necessary confidence boosting speech of his that followed thereafter, looked like a take off from his Avan-Ivan cameo with just a different script to jabber.
• Though the pacey song was sort of good, the other two were just establishment fillers & hence the music was disappointment for me, I felt they were either plagiarized err inspired ones,  or I-don't-have-much-bmgs-I-shall-repeat-the-same ones umpteen times.
• The most disappointing and needless thing about this movie is the one that happens during the end credits, its a true face-palm material.

Bottomline:

   This movie is truly worth the money for a big screen experience. Yet another humane gesture showcased. Time & statistics would be the real litmus test for the movie's success in its cause more than just the revenue for the producers of the movie.

Paradesi Review

      First things first and this movie has gained a lot of positives from what was seen as a let down from Bala in his previous attempt Avan-Ivan. There are quite a lot of facets that can be seen as a typical Bala ones in this film as well and some new additions to his skill set too.

The Typical Bala

• A dark subject and storyline.
• Characterization research
• Cast looks and costumes
• No happily-ever-after ending.
• Protagonist not glorified as heroic.
• Female cast having important roles
• First half having comic moments
• Characters having undergone physical overhaul for their roles.
• A song that mostly is unnecessary for the story.

The New Bala

• Firstly, he has stopped spoon feeding the audience with the screenplay to a great extent in this movie.
• Less gory & tragic scenes.
• A making-of-the-movie teaser as a promotional stunt.
• A crisp running length as needed for the movie.
• Bala the producer.

What worked?

• The length of the movie.
• The conviction of the output put forth by the entire cast.
• The music score.
• Screenplay being episodic in nature than being an usual one that lasts the entire lifetime of the protagonist.
• The movie has given popularity to a good extent to the book it was inspired from.

What did not work?

• The crispness in establishment of characters or spaces was a tad too much and been to the extent of not sufficiently believable throughout the entire movie. For eg : A large section of villagers agree to go on a mission to earn a better living, however the showcase of how bad their current lives were were missing. The only person who was convincing in this aspect was the protagonist as showcased aptly.
• On the same lines of the previous one the elements to indicate this being a period film could have been even more extensively showcased.  The village shown in the beginning was believable, which in the latter part of the movie was either missing or wasn't sufficient.
• There were quite a lot of between the lines left to the audience to fathom themselves, which was quite far from being acceptable. Ex: Periappa's demise had a build up to be hidden from Rasa but then what happened thereafter? His body was left to rot in the hut or what? A doctor was brought in to battle the disease, he preached Christianity ok fine, did he do what was called for? as the story immediately moved to 4 years later.

Some smaller pluses and lot of minuses did exist here and there in the movie which I don't want to get into and here I move on to the conclusion. 

Bottomline:

         This movie is neither a National Award material on any front and I would be greatly surprised if it did win nor it is as bad a typical commercial cinema and fares way better than that. Its definitely a good (if not great) attempt by Bala on a period subject. I would however not rate this movie as a best of his, but maybe it could be one of good ones this year! 

Vishwaroopam Review

             And finally after much hiatus Vishwaroopam opened in Tamil Nadu on 7th of Feb, 2013 and thanks to my buddies, I got a chance to see this on the same day. So as I headed to the movie I had this mental checklist of what to expect out of a Kamal movie and sort of put a tick against each of those as and when I experienced it.

• Kamal the protogonist - Checked (obvious)
• Kamal singing songs - Checked
• Kamal the lyricist - Checked
• Kamal and new heroine - Checked
• Lots of characters, though many may less screen presence - Checked
• A typical Kamal praising song - Checked
• A punchline from a past Kamal movie - Checked
• A share of  'let the audience figure out how' content - Checked
• A role Kamal hasn't donned before - Checked
• Experiment or bring on something new to local cinema- Checked 
• Controversy involved - Checked (becoming obvious too)
• Costing a fortune to the producer - Checked (Home production in this case)
• Attention to detail (in all aspects) - Checked

    Now some things that did not feature in the checklist but impressed me.

• The idea of choosing a story that would appeal to global audience than just the local or national ones.
• No fancy & disconnected between-the-scenes dream songs.
• In the world ample with showcasing the terror humans, this has something to offer about humane terrorists for a change.

   And those that failed to impress me

• Probably my expectation of a performance on par or bettering சலங்கை ஒளி made me feel disappointed in this Kathak piece.
• Flash back and forth placements.
• The extent of 'let the audience figure out how' quotient.
• Is that all needed to, not just get inducted into Al-Qaeda team but be looked upon as trustworthy as well, or did Kamal leave it to the audience to fathom themselves on how that could be possible?
• I would have taken lesser notice of the logical flaws in first fight sequence had it not been played again in slow motion, well sorry Kamal my bar is certainly very high for a perfectionist.
• Understandably a high budget one for an Indian movie, however still the movie couldn't seamlessly superimpose the different layers of real footage and surreal CG, imperfect still.
• Most fans as well as fanatics play the "I've never seen an Indian movie so good before, only Kamal can do" card. Well it implies that the fan is either an English movie frequent and hence is able to compare the finesse or a normal guy unexposed to worldly cinema and is all awe by this never seen before visuals. Come on guys stop the apples and oranges comparison.

   Lastly, on the controversial protests and cuts

• If muting / cutting those little scenes has upheld the sanctity of the religion then looks like we're heading to old-age future (in terms of freedom of speech and expression)
• The instances of jabbing at Hinduism or a specific caste and no protests or censor cuts has raised interesting questions.
• Are those belonging to it understood that it does not affect what they are or where they belong to?
• As it has been proved time and again across various movies 'these' people could be taken for a ride, for whatever reasons?

Bottomline: 

               Vishwaroopam is a high budget Kamal roopam and may NOT go into the book of movie classics for Indian Cinema, to those with the love for cinema its watchable once, to the cheque and MO sending ones nothing needs to be said & the maddening history repeats itself.

Neethaane En Ponvasantham - A Review

Prologue 

    Here I am up for a movie review dissection, after a long time. I would generally go about doing this when I feel cheated for the money I paid to watch the movie and not to sugar coat about every movie that I watch. There would be lots of reasons each time for watching a movie, well for Neethaane En Ponvasantham there were just two reasons that drew me to watch it. One, umpteen people calling this movie a good for nothing and waste of time on release day, by all possible expletives all over the social media and two, being witness to quite a lot  of tearing down of Ilayaraja music too.

Gold Vasantham

• As I write this, 24 hours since the end credits and I still could relate a lot to the yearn  expressed by Varun & Nithya for each other.
• Excellent makeover of Jiiva to be cast across aging periods which I think Gautham has already mastered this through his Vaaranam Aayiram. Samantha casting was pretty good too, just that I felt I couldn't see that age shift in persona in the other friends casting though.
• The Maestro is truly the Maestro PERIOD

Gold Covering Vasantham

• Well Gautham has tried to explain relationship issues (what's new in it? Well it is realistic and more importantly leaves a "I've been at that situation sometime" image  in minds of many in relationships, on date) to a folklore who either can't understand the subtleties of relationship realities or ardent fans of pure cinematic fictional love.
• At many places the scenes are sort of abstract and the connect would have to be perceived and rather not obviously spoon-fed. Well in this age of 'Smart' Phones & its (dumb) Users, movies that needs to perceived are scored down especially if its a tamil movie.
• Movies with blending songs that touch base and fly off, no dream sequence songs and what the fcuk? not even a shred of heroic fights, hey listen director off you go elsewhere if you want to succeed with such movies cos this is a land where one cannot live without most of it, NO MATTER WHAT.
• Ahh another sticking point: The pace of the movie. Come on Gautham go run, you are lagging way behind the likes of Sprinters Dharani, Hari, Perarasu et al. Well the crowd is always tuned for a 100m sprint while you present a marathon.
• Posters with tagline "This could be your love story" invites the "Oh ho, let me see if it is" people flocking into theaters only to be bewildered that it truly is, while the movie gets to be looked upon as a stark & shocking material thereafter leading to furore & scathing  on social forums, at large.

Bottomline

     In the name of Neethaane En Ponvasantham, Gautam Vasudev Menon has attempted being a Director Shankar on relationships (where the message is shouted, pleaded and tried to be passed on to all the viewers but ends up in vain). However sadly most of the audience expected a full course Dessert all along but they were served with bitter (truths) main courses which made them either puke or lose the interest for the (perceived) Dessert.

Manmadan Ambu - A Review

      

The Cruise

• The first thing one would realize after a scene or two of watching this movie is the reason behind naming the movie Man Madan Ambu(Kamal Maddy Trisha) and truly the title has done justice to the movie.
• With the finesse in cinematography being uptrend in Indian movies these days,  Manush Nandan's work has truly lived up-to it and kept the standards high.
• Casting has been spot on and its just picture perfect. Be it the choice or the number of people right from Sangeetha's two kids and Urvasi-Ramesh Aravind pair to the Malayali Producer couple.
• Its a typical Devi Sri Prasad music score and he has just been what he is, nothing new or nothing different to the common listener.
• Gowthami has done a commendable job when it comes to costumes, be it Kamal (no surprises on that) or from Madhavan to Madhavan's dad and from Trisha and Sangeetha to Usha Uthup.
• Shan Mohammed has done a splendid role as the editor which peaks in the Neelavaanam song.
• The Obvious Show Stealer was Kamal Haasan
  
  • The first catch for me as a movie enthusiast is obviously his looks, ONE OF A KIND is just the phrase I can put forth to describe, he still is just so flawless in his acting and it would only be apt to call him The Sachin Tendulkar of the Indian Cinema.
  • His prowess at screenplay and dialog writing is just so fantastic and has made sure a lot of subtle yet powerful messages be conveyed at various occasions in the movie.
  • This movie had been yet another instance to showcase his trademark natural-tears-swelling-up-in-the-eyes scene.
• Maddy has delivered the suspicious big-shot role to the extent it made sure that no one else could have done that better.
• A divorced Sangeetha looked so laudable and natural, has fit the bill with her set of thoughtful and realistic snippets about the guys.
• Trisha has donned her role to the best that was expected out of her fitting rightly as an actress on screen.
• Its a sort of a different combination of genres for K.S.Ravikumar with a mix of humor, smartness with lack of flashy dialogs and he has indeed done justice to add as another feather to his directorial cap. 
• Lastly the song Neelavaanam has just held the audience awestruck literally with its one of first of its kind song portrayals in Indian Cinema. Was it an inspired thought from this or was it a coincidence is a questions to ponder.

The Hole(s)

• The feel of contentment and rejoice at the interval was reduced considerably while walking out of the theater at the end of credits.
• The sort of confusions and dialogs that were tried at around the last 20 mins of the movie had the shades of Panchathanthiram sans the similar thrill and enjoyment, maybe that's the difference between Crazy Mohan and Kamal Hassan.
• Trisha revealing her feelings for Kamal wherein her mix of feelings of guilt, pity and concern seemed to have been extrapolated to love without adequate validation and was like "Its not Maddy anymore and now its Kamal" and the confusions later did not make the situation any better.
• The Maddy-Sangeetha pairing up towards the end was like the director telling "Oh...so you two are left out, ok come on quick, pair up!!!"

Bottomline

        The Cruise was set on sail en-route an amazing destination with a superb and adventurous journey all throughout however with a few holes found here and there. Did the Cruise reach the destination with the holes covered up or did the holes leave the Cruise sink into the ocean, is left to the audience to decide upon !!!

Aayirathil Oruvan

        Finally here we have Selvaraghavan's brain child, a couple of years after the resounding success and critical acclaim of Pudupettai. No doubt he has bettered himself (just himself) on the direction front.

The Sugar Coat

• The first and foremost thing that grabbed the attention was its sound track which was launched long back and still topping the charts.
• The detailing created to make a fictitious history, is laudable.
• The make up, locales and costumes have been really wonderful and hand picked and it reflects throughout the movie.

The Shell inside

• The story starts with the look out for the missing Prathap Pothan and apparently  post interval neither him nor Andrea Jeremiah play a role, in the movie.
• The sort of military force used throughout, though not named explicitly Indian Army anywhere as such, fails to paint a picture of a well trained force that is ready to face the fights and challenges, which can be seen throughout.
• The final war sequence caused some rib-tickling laughter in me, with the manner the "Warriors with guns" handled "The group with bows and arrows" and shelding the shower of arrows was a wonderful look alike from the movie 300.
• The portrayal of army men as a group greedy for molestation and sexual abuse, towards the end of the movie is rather too cheap and disgusting.
• The need for Karthik and his group of human wagons is just a stitch-in to make a role for him in the movie because the army men obviously must have undergone all those load carrying trainings and be capable enough to do that job themselves.
• The remix version of the whole Original அதோ அந்த பறவை போல song was too dragging and slow for the present.
• In the encounter with the red tribe, why did the Army head wait until the attacking tribal came too close and how come there was not a single instance of Reema Sen reloading her guns though being in the forefront, in the line of attack?
• Why Andrea Jeremiah did not inform or share the information on any traps and risks prior to her talking about snakes?
• Andrea Jeremiah remains grief stricken from the beginning and seem to be a person of few "sane" words and the expletive conversation with Reema Sen doesn't actually fit in for her character portrayed prior to that or even after that.
• Kathik has demeaned the basic man instincts on all the occasions where either Reema Sen or Andrea Jermiah slapped him.
• The liquor found by Karthik seemed to be very less and the following song  shows it in increased quantities at some scenes. Were everyone  too drunk to notice this detail?
• The graphics is excellent at some scenes and many other scenes its evidently pathetic and primitive. 
• Selvaraghavan hasn't yet found someone who can actually make the blood graphics look real, I think he should have taken cues from the movie 300, on this front.
• Not sure whether it was to avoid protests and controversies from Blue Cross or something, a disclaimer on Animals is put up in the beginning and  some of the scenes that shows birds and animals lack clarity and its clearly visible that those are a cut and paste from elsewhere.
• Why and how would a single camel be found at a place which does not have any source of food or water or even shrubs?
• After a slave gives the Army head, a message from Reema Sen, he appears to search for signal to make a call. If it was supposedly a satellite phone he shouldn't have made such a gesture or if a normal mobile phone how was he able to get a signal at a place where there is no sign of any signal source within miles of his vicinity?
• When he was able to perform the act of strangling Reema Sen  via her shadow, why couldn't Parthiban perform miracles on the battleground?
• How the water (drunk by the Chola warriors) became poisonous just because Reema Sen added a few drops of her blood onto to it?
• The sudden "drinks break" for the Chola warriors during the final battle was " a poor directorial connect"  to the fact that Reema Sen had spilt her blood in the water earlier.
• The movie's end was neither a conclusion to the story which originally began as the conquest to find Prathap Pothan nor on the front from Reema Sen's quest for her lost goddess idol.

The Verdict...

         ஆயிரத்தில் ஒருவனை கானுபவர்களில் ஆயிரத்தில் ஒருவனாவது பாராட்டுவாரா ??