Ravanan

Ravanan – Mani Ratnam’s latest super hit. A movie with great expectations, waited for a long time. After a long gap Mani has made a tamil movie. This time instead of dubbing he made the movie for Hindi and Tamil audiences. Ravan for hindi and Ravanan for Tamil.

Ravanan, staring Vikram, Aishwarya Rai, Prithviraj in the lead role released on June 18th. Before anything about the movie a great applause for V.Manikandan and Santosh Siva for their excellent cinematography, nice camera shots, locations that perfectly matched the scenes and their emotions.

Veera, full name is Veerasamy (Vikram) , who resemble the epic ravanan, not in look but in activities. Veera’s lanka is a small village near Tirunelveli, he rules the village, many of the people loves and respect him and others fears him, neither government nor police can do anything against Veera. How powerful Veera is shown nicely by the director at the beginning of the movie where Veera take a jump from a cliff very high into the water at the same time his fellow members attacks and kills the police men and set their vehicles on fire. Always

As movie starts Veera kidnaps Raagni (Aishwarya Rai) and takes her to a nearby mountain surrounded with thick dense forest. Raagni is wife of Dev Prakash (Prithviraj) who is a police officer – encounter specialist , who has been in this case of finding and killing Veera. Veera with his brothers Singarasan (Prabhu) and Sakkarai (Munna), leads the team of people who do anything for them in return even their lives. Now Dev with this force started for hunting Veera in the forest with the help of the forest guard played by Karthick. Meantime Veera tries to frighten Raagni in different ways but she appears to be so bold, once even she jump from the mountain telling Veera that he can’t kill her, by seeing all these a sympathy started in the mind of Veera which later turned to be a love towards her, but for Raagni, Veera is a cruel guy. She has to face lot of painful situations but her belief was that Dev will come to save her. Meantime Veera started catching some of the officers who supported Dev and either killed or heavily injured. Till the first half the movie which goes little slower and keeps suspense why Veera kidnapped Raagni. In the second half Veera relieves the secret to Raagni that in the interest of catching Veera, Dev once planned an operation to attack him during the marriage function of his younger sister Vennila (Priyamani), Dev shot Veera in his neck and his fellow men took him for safety. To get back Veera, Hemanth Kumar (the officer in charge under Dev) took Vennila to police station and the police men their raped her. Next day she committed suicide. This was the reason why Veera want to take revenge against Dev so he kidnapped Raagni but by seeing her courage he couldn’t kill her instead started loving her. After knowing the story behind the revenge Raagni started having a soft feeling against Veera. Meantime Dev killed his younger brother Sakarai which led to an open fight between Veera and Dev, rest forms the move, will Dev be successful in getting back his wife Raagni, will Raagni be able to go back with Dev.

Though the movie is too slow the climax turns to be perfect. This time Mani Ratnam lacks the story line. And some of scenes are not so clear, like there should be little more scenes to make Veera feels a love towards Raagni (director explained it through the lyrics of the background song), the reason for the revenge turns to be very common applied in many of the movies repeatedly. Another poor thing about the movie is the makeup. While making a movie like this director should have much consider the costume and makeup. Throughout the movie Aishwarya appears to be fresh with little blood stains in face. She was there in forest for 14 days without proper food and shelter, walking always with Veera in thick forest but still so fresh looking. The director was too busy in handling the movie in both the languages simultaneously he missed out these types of fine things. Regarding acting Vikram did a good job but has expected more from him, Aishwaya Rai had did her role well, Prithviraj has much less scenes to do but did well, lot of star casting but they have very few to act like Prabhu, Karthick (nice as funny forest gaurd), Priyamani, and others.

The music score by A.R.Rahman is good and a highlight for the movie.

Movie written by Mani Ratnam and Suhasini, produced by Mani Ratnam itself under the banner of Madras Talkies and released all over the world by Reliance Big Pictures.

Watch Ravanan in theatres only since the highlight is the cinematography, sound and music.

Movie is watchable

Singam

Singam - The new action oriented Surya movie released on May 28 in theaters turned to be a huge success. Director Hari had tried to add all usual tamil ingredients to make the movie a hit, since his last move Seval was a flop. Hari is the director who used give some sort of difference in the storyline (though having with same village backdrop) disappointed this time by becoming a copy cat. The Surya staring Singam in a mixture to 2 hit movie Anjathey and his own super hit Sammy.

Durai Singam (Surya) is a sub inspector in a small town Nallore in Thoothukudi District. He loves and loved by everyone in the village. Mayil Vaaganam (Prakash Raj) is a big don in Chennai city who controls all local gangs who do all sorts of kidnapping, blackmailing, fights through out the city. Ministers and police fears to take action against Mayil Vaaganam. Kavya (Anushka – Vetakaran fame) came to Nallore to meet her grand mother (Manorama), and fallen love with Durai Singam. As usual romantic songs, and dances. Everything was moving smooth till Mayil Vaaganam came to Nallore for a case, and had an encounter with Singam. Since Nallore is Singams home land, Mayil Vaaganam couldnt do anything against him, so he brought Singam to Chennai and made Inspector for Thiruvanmiyur and started pressurizing him, finally Singam decided to have an open fight with Mayil Vaaganam. The major problem facing by the city was kidnapping controlled by Mayil Vaaganam, but no cases has been registered against him, the home minister assigns Singam as Office in charge for Anit-Kidnap Force and promote him as Assistant Comissioner. Now Singam starts his game of hunting down Mayil Vaaganam , his brother and all those who support him, lot of action sequence and some usual romantic dance numbers with Anushka (totally unnecessary).

Though it gives a feel that the movie has something interesting to tell, as its trailer says so, it has nothing to say. The main story is much similar to Anjathey (where Narein plays the role of Police office in the team who handles the case to catch a team who kidnaps people and blackmail them for money. The climax of the movie is also very similar in which villain fools the police but misleading them, the intelligence of the hero finds out the case). The backdrop of Singam is much similar to Sammy (where Vikram played the role of rough police officer who comes to Tirunelveli and brings the city under control).
There is not much to say about the cinematography and script. Many of the scenes are not very clear that the audience will not be able to understand. Surya did a good job with a nice, powerful look. Prakash Raj has nothing big to do and much similar acting what he did in Gilli and Sivakasi. For most of the recent movie the comedy track is very poor. Vivek who handled the comedy track for the movie is very poor. It is hard to even smile; most of the scenes are copy and same gestures. Anuska – nothing to write, has very little to do in the movie, even low number of scenes when compared to Vetaikaran.
Action sequence are very good, Hari, as his all earlier movies given importance to music and with Harris Jayraj has given some good numbers.
Movie cast : Surya, Anuska, Prakash Raj, Nazar, Vivek, Radha Ravi, Vijay kumar Nizhalgal Ravi, Manorama.
Movie produced by K. E. Gnanavel Raja and Sun pictures brought it to theaters.
Singam-watch it if you like Surya.

Raajneeti

Raajneeti : The new political thriller produced and directed by Prakash Jha came to theatres this Friday, is a nice movie to watch. Many of the casting in the movie resembles to current day politicians.

Bharathi Pratap daughter of CM, had an illicit relationship with Bhaskar (Naseeruddin Shah) ,who left her with her Unborn child. Brij Gopal (Nana Padekar) brother of Bharathi left the new born baby in a boat and made Bharathi to marry Chandra Pradap (Chetan Padit) , all these happened in the past, now Bharathi doesn’t know where her lost son is. Suraj (Ajay Devgan) is the lost son who was brought up by a poor villager, Suraj is very popular in their community and very good Kabati player. Other side Bharathi’s husband Chandra Pradap with his elder brother Bhanu Pratap leads a national political party, and Chandra Pradap helps his brother in the political activities. When the state government collapses, at the same time Bhau Pratap had a stroke and he handed over his party power to his younger brother Chandra Pratap and his elder son Prithvi Pratap (Arjun Rampal), instead of his own son Virendra Pratap (Manoj Bajpai), this created a rivalry between Prithvi and Virendra Pratap. Prithvi Pratap has a younger brother Samar Pratap (Ranbir Kapoor) who was in US and came to India to meet his parents. Virendra Pratap brought Suraj (Ajay Devgan) against Prithvi Pratap, and out of the rivalry Chandra Pratap was attacked in a car shoot out, while Chandra Pratap was at hospital Virendra Pratap and Suraj had plan and arranged a case upon Prithvi and made him behind the bars. All these forced Samar to get into the political fight. He convinced Virendar that he with his brother will go back to US if all the charges upon his brother is removed, trusting him Virendar did so, but when Priviti was free from jail they brokeup the party and made a new one with Brji Gopal and Samar as the executer. Samar’s aim was to make his brother win the election and take revenge against Verendar and Suraj. Indu Pratap (Katrina Kaif) was a daughter of a rich business man in the city, she loves Samar, but Samar had a girl friend Sarah (Sarah Jean Thompson). Since Prithvi’s new party need a financial support, everyone forced Prithvi to marry Indu. Meantime Sarah also came to India from US. The growing popularity of Prithvi and Samar made Verendar and Suraj a little bit tensed, therefore again they planned to kill Samar and kept a bomb in his car, but unfortunately Sarah and Prithvi were the victims, later how Samar take the revenge, will Verendar and Suraj be successful, what are the new games they plan in the Raajneti, is the rest of the movie.

A well written script and a best star casting is the great success of the movie. Every actors had done their roles in the best possible way. Nasurdeen Shah, Nan Padekar, were best in their roles.

Movie Cast : Ajay Devgan, Nana Patekar, Ranbir Kapoor, Katrina Kaif, Manoj Bajpai, Arjun Rampal, Naseeruddin Shah, Sarah Thompson, Ishaan Khattar.

Movie produced by Prakash Jha,Ronnie Screwvala.

Movie is nice to watch.

Mummy & Me

Mummy & Me: A good movie with good message, director Jithu Joseph took a very common subject that happens in mostly all families , between mother and Teenage daughter. The movie drags a little, the attempt of director to describe many of the situations and feelings through songs (Malayalam and English) should be appreciated.

The movie is about a teenage girl Jewel ( Archana Kavi – Neelathamara fame) and her mother Clara (Urvasi), Jewel in her teenage has a feeling that her mother is more strict and unnecessarily involve in her life,in her wishes, etc. Clara represent common mother is more concern about her daughter, since she is in her teenage period Clara fears whether her daughter moves in a wrong direction. The only one person who loves Jewel (as Jewel feels) is her fat her Joseph (Mukesh) who is a bank manager. Most of Joseph’s evenings have to be spending in settling the quarrel between Jewel and Clara. Clara interferes in all the activities of Jewel which Jewel doesn’t like, about her dressing style, late coming home, chatting, etc. Jewel started having a feeling of alone in her life, with nobody who understands her, on the same time Rahul (Kuchako Bobin) who is Jewels best friend son of Lalu Alex who is childhood friend of Joseph. Rahul loves Jewel but doesn’t have courage to tell her. Day by day Jewel’s attitude towards Clara was getting worse, the way of talking, the way of behaviour everything became worse, this made Joseph and Clara very much upset, meantime Jewel got a chatting friend (Asar – voice by Suresh Gopi ) soon Jewel and Asar became very good friends, how Asar started influencing Jewel, what all changes happened in Jewel, will she understands how much her parents love her, will Clara and Joseph able to bring back their daughter, is the rest of the movie. The climax of the movie is good and impressive.

The movie is written and directed by Jithu Joseph, and produced by Joy Thomas Sakthikulangara for Jithin Arts. The music done by Sejo John is good. The actors Archana Kavi as Jewel did a good job, Urvashi (Clara) and Mukesh (Joseph) are good in their roles as usual, Urvasi was quiet different from Achuvinte Amma (similar type subject).Kuchako Boban has very few importance and the role done by him as Rahul is very small that it can be done even by a new comer.

Movie Casts : Kuchako Boban, Urvasi, Archana Kavi, Mukesh, Lalu Alex, Janardhanan, Shari.

A real watchable movie.