Out came a thought and then another...

A family wedding is one of the best places to be at soon after a major media event. Especially if said media event is of the magnitude of Sivaji. Everyone you earlier thought was ridiculous offered you a fresh chance to reaffirm your opinion. Slim facts flew from every corner: They spent 56 crores to make Sivaji. Gah, they spent 101 crores. No, no, NDTV said 86 crores. Rajini was paid 36 crores. No, 17 crores. Did you look at the grand sets? Anand's photography was too good. Cinematography. All the same pa. Rahman's music was too loud. It was the speakers in the theatre you idiot. Apu's saree is the same colour as Shriya's dress in that song...what song...aiyyo. Shriya's dress? What dress? It was barely dress. That harem song pa. What is it? Sahana? Who knows, ellame orey bramaandam. Athirudhu la. Yeah, the songs were good. Did you see how fair Rajini was? Ooooh gross! But he looked so young in the movie. Shriya is so beautiful. I loved her accessories. She was an accessory you mean? Vivek is the saving grace (yours truly nodded sagely at this remark). Hey, padam paathiya, super illa? Couldn't you tell me you had tickets!...

I am your average movie watcher. I do not bother too much about the specifics of the movie as long as the screenplay is entertaining enough to make my couple of hours fly. In fact I do not even mind willingly suspending my disbelief for the entire length of the movie. But it had better be a narration that doesn't lose its way and scream at the audience for further help.

I won't call myself a die-hard Rajini fan who has made up her mind to like the movie as soon as it has been announced. Yet, I don't discredit the man or his appeal. I forget how many times I have watched Guru Sishyan; I can repeat the dialogues easily. Or of how impressed I was when Baasha was such a respectable masala. And Thillu Mullu is a classic of course. Which is why I think Sivaji is such a disappointment - as a Rajini movie, as a Shankar movie, as a much awaited masala movie. To me, it fails on all these counts. What the movie is is a hodge-podge of cliches, of tired old styles, of the corruption theme beaten to its hollow sorry death. And all of these would have been acceptable had they at least been woven together with some consideration for the viewer. Script? what script! It is as if the bosses involved in the movie said, lets dazzle them with grandeur, let us create scarcity and let us get out of all our debts. And, one must give it to them for that. Success.

I remember watching some celebrities being asked their opinion about how the movie was. Their replies were very predictable. In Rajinispeak there are no words to express negatives. All you can do if you hate it is to say it is good. That is as negative as it can get. I think a lot of people would have been happy to see a funny Rajini doing his funny antics in a light movie. In other words a repeat of all his other movies, without nauseating the audience with tubes of fair & lovely silliness and plates of tummy churning red chillies. And doing it on and on for three hours at that. For one scene of a smart mottai boss, three hours of unwilling suspension of sanity. Sigh, I don't even know if I can like Solomon Pappiah anymore.

Posted by Echo/Lavanya on Saturday, July 14, 2007 at 3:03 PM | Permalink