Vettaiyadu Vilaiyadu Movie Review

August 26, 2006 at 11:25 pm (Personal)

Just came back from Vettaiyadu Velaiyadu – Innovative multiplex, Bangalore.

First, it’s a kamal movie – so I was already going to watch it sooner or later anyway. But after listening to “Machi, You’ve got to watch this movie da, this is ultimate! It’s like watching a movie ten years ahead of it’s time da. Don’t miss it” by my friend Veera, I decided to watch it the very next day. Guess what, Veera wanted to watch it again and offered to join for another show.

Movie starts with a 007 style action – Kamal against a local don – dishum dishum – kamal wins and the title song kicks in. Intro graphics are ordinary but the music score was cool. Kamal looks his usual charismatic – only a touch old and little out of shape. One thing, the way he walks, talks and moves with a stiff poture makes us imagine if his clothes were probably over starched or something :)

For the next 30 minutes will give you a feeling of watching three different tamil movies in cricket highlights style. Prakash Raj, his wife and daughter – all turning out as victims of a serial killer. Finally everyone dies and Kamal goes to NYC to investigate the killings.

You can see Kamal with loads of cute chicks around him in the flight to NYC. I don’t know if this was just coincidence or purposeful – but all of them looked like super models from Milan or Paris. Never had any one like that sit next to me when I happened to fly :(

As we enjoy watching these pretty ladies, boom! We are bombarded with a really lengthy flashback of Mr. and Mrs Raghavan(Kamal and his dead wife Kamalee). Yes, Yes – We’ve seen these flashback way too many times! From the days of “Vetri Vizha” – Dashing brave cop. Falls in love with a cute girl. Gets married. Villains kill the girl and the cop takes revenge.

But God is not so merciless, he at least saves us from Kamal’s “Abirami-Abirami” style crying by asking Harris Jeyaraj to pitch in with some sad back ground music when Kamal mourns the death of Kamalee.

We are still struggling to come out of Kamal’s flashback and boom! We have Jyothika on screen now. What’s she doing in a NY hotel room after being ditched by her husband in Seattle which is on the other end of the United States? Oh! Yes, she came to New York to stay in the room right next to Kamal so that he can save him while she attempts to commit suicide. Yeah, now we get the hint.

Kamal teams up with a phirangi police officer Anderson to crack down on the murderers in New York. Kamal is gifted with super natural powers called “Raghavan’s instinct” and leads the NY Police to find dead bodies of people who were killed in four different places in the USA. Wow!

What’s even more miraculous is that Kamal cracks the traces of the serial killers with ease and manages to find them in no time. You would notice that Kamal uses a MacBook (Apple laptop) to help him with the investigation. Kamal sir, if only you used a Microsoft Windows XP based laptop you would have solved this mystery even earlier :)

Gautam suddenly realizes that it’s only two hours in to the movie now and he can’t let Kamal catch the villains so soon – he makes the villains escape from NY and hit Mumbai to sing “Neruppe Sikki Mukki Neruppe” with Deepal Shaw dancing in the beaches of Goa.

Story shifts to India then with Jyothika and Kamal hitting Chennai next week.

Kamal usually bonds easily with his woman on screen and you can see a spark in the relationship right from the start. Well, this movie is one big exception! Kamal and Jyothika are a total misfit on screen and behave like some uncle and aunty! Has Kamal lost his charm with the ladies?

Do I have to tell you how a Climax will shape in a Cop movie? Yes Yes – villains kidnap the heroine and wants Kamal to come to a remote location in the outskirts of the city.

As expected, hero Mr. Raghavan(Kamal) comes on top and wins the final battle to reclaim Jyothika – only to find her buried under the earth for the entire time he was fighting the villains. What happens from now is something which anyone can guess, and am not going to tell you more.

Positives from the movie

• Kamal , Kamal’s getup, Kamal’s dressing
• Harris Jeyaraj
• Ravi Verma’s camera
• Song sequence of “Paartha Mudal Naale” with Kamal and Kamalniee is cute
• The NYPD detective guy “Anderson”

Negatives

• Loose story line
• Non-impressive dialogues
• Too much similarity with Kaaka Kaaka for characters, dialogues and sequences
• Gautam tries to create an impact by making the corpses look as gory as possible! Ech!
• Too lengthy ! Too many sub-stories within the main plot

There are lots of petty things that I cannot resist to crib about –

1. There are the subtitles that come every 10 or 15 minutes telling the audience the date and time for every scene. Come on Gautam, we are not fighting against time here to detonate a soon to explode Nuclear bomb here. This is not “Sum of all fears” or “Mission Impossible”. It’s a normal paced masala story and there is absolutely no need to tell us what day or time it is when Jyothika and Kamal wake up and meet in the Hotel lobby every day!
2. There is a flashback for almost every character in the movie!
3. Kamal using a Public Phone in NY to call India while he has a Moto Razr with him all the time
4. Unnecessary information on the serial killers and their RESEARCH PROJECTS to save HUMANITY. Crap!
5. Frequent “beeps” and “mutes” between dialogues due to use of offensive language. If you cannot convice the censor board to allow using them then why use them in the first place and later mute them?
6. Jothika tells Kamal that the food that they service in the hotel is very American and wants to go to “Indian Café” to have some desi food. Ok, so there they are sitting in the Indian Café munching a Bread Toast with Spoon and Knife. Wow! How desi it looks!

Signing off in Sun TV thirai vimarsanam style punch dialogue!

 

Kaaka Kaaka was like adrenaline
Vettaiyadu Velaidya was like Anacin(headache)!

 

Fantasy Cricket