Vennila Kabadi Kuzhu- Tamil Cinema continues its good form

After a string of good films like Anjathey, Subramaniapuram, Poo etc in 2008, Tamil cinema continues its good run in 2009. With Bala’s Naan Kadavul (read the article- http://passionforcinema.com/naan-kadavul-bala-is-back-in-style/ ) and now director Susindhran’s impressive debut movie- Vennila Kabadi Kuzhu, 2009 looks quite promising indeed. Of late sport’s themed movies have been coming out in plenty especially in the area of cricket. After Iqbal,Chak De India, Chennai -28 ( some of the better sport’s themed movies of late) comes one more in that series- Vennila Kabadi Kuzhu ( VKK here after).Its a co-incidence that the day VKK released, another sport’s theme movie –Victory also released
The movie has some shades similar to Chak De India. First of all this is a story of an underdog team & is not individual specific. Also while CDI spoke about hockey, VKK goes even different & talks about Kabadi, a sport not very mainstream, yet deeply routed in our psyche. The movie’s cast primarily consists of debutants except the heroine- Saranya Mohan & the coach- Kishore. The story set in a village near Pazhani is about Mari (Vishnu) a boy who is very interested in Kabadi. After the death of his father he is forced to work in the zamindar’s fields. The boy grows up & is now a fringe player in the Kabadi team of the village. All the players are from different backgrounds & the team has disrepute of losing most of the games.
Once after losing a game, the team decides to call a nearby village team (a soft team) for their annual village festival so that they can win & redeem their pride in front of their villagers. Also during this village festival comes a girl from Madurai to the village (Saranya Mohan).Mari and the girl fall in love without speaking much. When the game is about to begin, the Vennila ( home team) is dismayed to find that the other team has brought in outside players to play, thus making it tough to win. Mari plays the game by default & the game ends in confusion. At the same time the girl goes back to Madurai after the festival is over after promising Mari she will back for the next festival.
Now the team is ridiculed by the whole village and that is when one of the team members finds out that there is a state level tournament happening in Madurai. The team decides to go to Madurai & try their luck. They know this may be their last opportunity to redeem their pride. A state level player cum coach ( Kishore) who happens to be there helps the team to play. What happens from thereon is what the 2nd half of the movie is mainly all about. Camera work by Laxman and music by Selvaganesh help the movie quite well. Susindhran’s effort at character building helps tremendously. While Vishnu & Saranya do their roles well, Kishore and the rest of the team look quite convincing. The semi rural milieu of T.N has been captured very well. For producer K.Anand Chakravarthy, the movie is a winner all the way.
All said and done my only question to Susindhiran is why did you have to end the movie like this? Yes the ending is truly shocking, but was this necessary? Or was this with an eye to win the audience sentiment? But overall the movie works in a big way. Go for the movie, you won’t be disappointed.

Originally published in PFC, check it out here-http://passionforcinema.com/vennila-kabadi-kuzhu-tamil-cinema-continues-its-good-form/comment-page-1/#comment-342383

Why can’t there be more such ‘lucky’ happenings?

I happened to come across a news report 3 days ago on IndiaFM/Bollywood Hungama that Priyan is all set to make a movie on AIDS awareness with Akshay Kumar and Mohanlal. What was even more surprising is that the budget is only Rs.1 crore (link ) . So it is obvious that Akshay and Mohanlal are definitely acting for free due to the nature of the project. That both of them are good friends of Priyan also helps in a big way.
While this development is certainly praiseworthy I started thinking that it certainly makes it easy for directors/producers who are in close proximity with some stars to utilize their services to make genuine middle of the road movies, projects which would otherwise probably not reach out to the masses so easily. But what about the smaller movie makers or debutant directors & producers? Would they be able to get the benefit of such a possibility happening to them?
Of course there are instances of even people like Amitabh Bachchan doing a Bhojpuri movie- Ganga purely because it was produced by his long standing make-up man, Deepak Sawant. But I’m not really referring to these incidents. I’m also not referring to 31 stars doing the song in OSO for free or the latest- Kareena, Deepika and Priyanka featuring in a song for free in Billu. I’m talking about instances where a star/popular actor genuinely went out of his way to do a movie for someone based on the subject and obviously without keeping his remuneration in mind.
I know for a fact that Mohanlal is one such actor. He has a history of doing a lot of projects purely because the film maker or someone connected with the movie would have been able to convince him with the subject potential. Why go deep into the past, I can name recent instances of at least 3 movies which he did as recently as in 2008 without keeoing his remuneration in mind and because he liked the movie’s subject. Sample this – Lal has recently completed shooting for a Malayalam movie called Bhagawan in a flat 17 hours!!! Yes I know it sounds too good to believe. And no this was not a couple of scenes that he shot, rather he plays the protagonist. The movie is a thriller directed by Prashanth Mambuli & is all about an incident in a hospital that happens between 9 A.M & 11 A.M in a single morning. (Check out the link- http://sify.com/movies/malayalam/fullstory.php?id=14820258&cid=2362 ).The movie is still awaiting its release (did not release on Jan 26th as was originally intended).
Last year among the various releases that Mohanlal had 2 of them need to be singled out here. The first was Mizhikal Sakshi, a small movie directed by Ashok R.Nath and revolving around a mute Muslim mother’s (Sukumari) struggle after her son ( Mohanlal) is falsely accused of bombing a train. It was a movie which belonged to Sukumari all the way but still Mohanlal had the conviction to do it. The other movie is Pakalnakshatrangal, directed by Rajeev Nath and story by Anoop Menon. The movie revolves around the life of Siddharthan a popular filmmaker who falls from a building and dies. The story is unveiled through his son, played by Anoop Menon. It was Anoop Menon here who did the job of convincing Mohanlal for the role. Apparently Mohanalal and Suresh Gopi (playing a scientist) completed their shooting in around 10 days flat for the movie.
Well I’m sure we can come up with more such instances similar to the one’s I have written about here. I would like to hear from you all about the one’s known to you. I know that there are a lot of aspiring filmmakers and story writers in PFC and this is just an attempt to tell you all (including me) that we can get “lucky” too :)

Originally published in PFC,check it out here- http://passionforcinema.com/why-can%e2%80%99t-there-be-more-such-%e2%80%98lucky%e2%80%99-happenings/

Billu- A Story of a Barber and a Superstar

6 Weeks ago I had written about why I look forward to Billu ( Barber) ( check out the link- http://passionforcinema.com/why-i-look-forward-to-billu-barber/ ) and now after seeing it I want to share with you my feelings on the movie. So yes by now we all know the movie is a modern day adaptation of the Krishna- Sudama story which was first made in Malayalam as Kadha Parayumbol and later made in Tamil-Kuselan & Telugu- Kathanayakudu.
Simply put “Billu” is the story of a barber- Bilas Rao Pardesi(Irfan Khan) who lives by his principles in a village with his beautiful wife (Lara Dutta) and kids. One day his childhood friend, superstar- Sahir Khan (SRK) comes to the village for a film shoot & Billu’s life then undergoes a journey of dramatic twists. First things first Priyan has done an almost honest remake of the Malayalam original and has not put in any of the bizarre extravagant stuff that the Tamil & Telugu versions were much maligned for.
Screenplay by Priyan and Mushtaq Sheikh doesn’t deviate from the core story and keeps it simple. Pritam has given some chartbusting music. Luckily SRK’s songs have been blended into the narrative and do not stick out like a sore thumb.V.Manikandan’s camera captures some good shot’s of the outdoors in Pollachi ( near Coimabtore). Performances wise Irfan is definitely good & he is natural in it. In some scenes he reminds me of the chaiwala role that he played in Mumbai Meri Jaan.Lara Dutta in a deglamourised role is quite effective.Om Puri,Rajpal Yadav,Rasika Joshi,Asrani,Manoj Joshi,Jagadish and the others do an ok job.
There are a lot of light moments in the movie interspersed with the emotional moments. Yes talking about SRK the actor, let’s just say he does well in the climax which is one of the best moments of the film. Also there are a lot of scenes where he speaks cheekily with reference to industry related events and peculiarities. SRK the producer tries to do a balancing act between allowing the spotlight on Irfan and also trying to keep himself in front reasonably enough with an eye on the box office.
He is able to do a decent act of balancing the same. So don’t I have my concern areas? Sure, here I go- sometimes you get a feel SRK is trying to be there in every frame without being there (you see him in posters everywhere) and this could have been toned down a bit. Also some of the characters appear like caricatures and at times the pace of the movie does drop. But overall the movie is fairly engaging and it is a decent family entertainer. Those who haven’t watched any of the earlier versions (Malayalam,Tamil,Telugu) will find it even more interesting. Path breaking cinema it isn’t, but then did it ever pretend to be one? :)

Originally published in PFC- check the link- http://passionforcinema.com/billu-a-story-of-a-barber-and-a-superstar/

It’s Arundhati fever for the Telugu Film Audience

The Telugu film industry has been at the cross roads for sometime. While on the one hand you have the big movies with the big stars, producers & directors who mainly try to cater to the fans of the stars, you also have a new set of filmmakers who have started getting noticed with their small movies. The New Year 2009 started off mainly for the Telugu film industry in the middle of January with Pongal/Sankranti – an important festival. This year’s Pongal releases were mainly veteran producer M.S.Raju’s Maska- directed by B.Gopal ,starring Ram,Hansika & Sheela, Allari Naresh’s Fitting Master and director Kodi Ramarishna’s Arundhati with Anushka,Sonu Sood & Sayaji Shinde.
Maska was supposed to carry good reports with Ram on a high after last year’s big hit- Ready & Hansika being quite popular as well. Fitting Master is a trademark Allari Naresh movie & was expected to make money as it was a low budget movie. But Arundhati was a surprise element. People were not sure about its prospects. At a budget of 13 crores it was a big risk considering it was a female oriented movie & belonged to the horror/thriller genre. But as the festival drew nearer more & more screens seemed to be getting added for Arundhati & the speculative talk was good based on the promos.
On Pongal day-14th Jan, the verdict was out. Maska the popular choice was struggling to stay in the race, Fitting Master was not as good as the last few Allari Naresh’s movies but Arundhati was a winner & a gigantic one at that. People of all kinds seemed to throng the theatres to watch the movie. The direction by Kodi Ramakrishna & the acting by Anushka, Sonu Sood & Sayaji Shinde is getting appreciated by one & all. The movie begins with Anushka’s wedding preparations in Hyderabad. She is supposed to get married to Arjun Bajwa (of Fashion fame) & all of a sudden a turn of events brings her to her native place in Gadwal Samasthanam.
There in a dilapidated old palace lies the spirit of Pasupathy ( Sonu Sood) who was a very wicked man & the brother in law of Arundhati ( Anushka again) the queen of Gadwal 3 generations ago. The present Arundhati is supposed to be the re-incarnation of the previous queen & since Pasupathy’s spirit wants revenge against Arundhati, it now unleashes terror upon the area. Sayaji Shinde plays a Fakir- Anwar, who helps Arundhati in this crusade. Watch the movie to know what exactly happened to Arundhati & Pasupathy in the past and how Arundhati faces up to the challenge of Pasupathy in the present.
At times the special effects do look tacky but overall the sets look very grand and the canvas of the movie looks quite impressive. But mind you the movie is not a feel good fun loving movie, nor is it any realistic portrayal. It’s escapist cinema with its share of chills and thrills. And yes with an A certificate its better to keep children away from the movie as some of the scenes are indeed gory.
Kodi Ramakrishna who shot into prominence with Ammoru (Amman in Tamil) had a major disaster with Chiranjeevi’s Anji & is back to top form. Anushka couldn’t have asked for a better project as she’s seized the opportunity with both hands & delivered a great performance. Sonu Sood is outstanding – he continues to improve with each movie, Sayaji Shinde finally manages to get something different from his stereotypical roles & does well. Shyam Prasad Reddy the producer has lots to cheer from the movie as its getting dubbed in a few other languages & there are talks of remaking it in Hindi.
Though Charmee ( Anukokunda Oka Roju, Mantra ), Bhoomika ( Missama, Anasuya) & Mumait Khan ( Maisamma IPS) have done a few noticeable female oriented movies, they have all been either movies catering to the A centers ( AOR, Mantra,Missama & Anasuya) or to the B& C centers ( Maisamma IPS). But Arundhati is a universal hit & that makes the success of the movie even more special. Well into the 4th week of its run, the movie is still attracting its audiences. It’s truly Arundhati fever for the Telugu film audience.

Note- Originally published on PFC.Check it out here
http://passionforcinema.com/its-arundhati-fever-for-the-telugu-film-audience/

Naan Kadavul: Bala is back in style

After a wait of around 3 years Bala is back with his 4th movie – Naan Kadavul. Riding on the commercial success and critical acclaim that his earlier movies- Sethu,Nandha & Pithamagan have garnered, Naan Kadavul had raised a lot of expectations from the day the project was announced. The very title- “Naan Kadavul” ( Aham Bramhasmi) which means I am God was very suggestive and took the people by surprise. The project was steeped in controversies be it Ajith walking out of the movie, the spat between Bala and Ajith, Bala’s decision to cast Arya as Rudran the protagonist, the constant change of heroines, shooting schedules getting stretched ,the overall duration that the project underwent or finally getting the film to release.
Well all that is over & the movie is now finally out. That in itself is a big reason for Bala to feel relieved. I am not trying to do a review of the movie per se, but yes I would like to comment on what I’ve felt after watching Naan Kadavul. First of all I am of the opinion that one must as a viewer be able to more or less slot the movie that he/she is watching. It could range from a harmless time pass flick which you can enjoy while watching and maybe even forget it later, a hard core spellbinding movie – whatever be the genre which you keep thinking about even later or a mindless movie – no whatever the names connected with it, you wish you hadn’t seen it.
Naan Kadavul here easily falls in the category of a spellbinding movie- one which keeps you thinking about it for hours even after watching it. It won’t be a lie if I were to tell that I’m still thinking about the movie, having seen it last night. There are so many intricacies in the plot that the more I think about it, the more insights I’m getting in mind. So when a movie makes you keep thinking about it, I believe the director has indeed done a good job. In this case the credit goes in a big way to Bala.
The film starts off impressively enough in Kasi and though the Kasi scenes do not last long, you get to see glimpses of the place that you usually do not get to see. Arya’s character Rudran, is left behind by his father in Kasi 14 years ago due to a doomed prophecy by an astrologer. Now 14 years later the father wants to repent for his mistake and comes to Kasi in search of his son. But his son is now Rudran an ‘Aghori’ ascetic.Though Rudran comes back to his hometown, Malaikoil in Tamilnadu, he is not able to accept the typical domestic life & leaves home to live with other sadhus in a shrine atop a hill. Interspersed with Rudran’s story is that of a beggar’s group which also survives for living on the same shrine.
The group is managed by Murugan who runs it for Thandavan, a cruel exploiter of the beggars and physically challenged people. Enters Hamsavalli ( Pooja) a blind singer into the fold of beggars and Rudran gets involved in this bad world of Thandavan and the beggars unexpectedly. How Rudran goes about fulfilling his mission as an Aghori is what the rest of the movie is all about. The movie is truly multidimensional. On one hand you have Rudran and his ways of living and the spiritual dimension, on the other hand you have a look at how hard life can be for beggars and how they are exploited. And in spite of the theme being so serious Bala has to his credit managed to infuse humour subtly in a lot of places.
Most of the actors are new and have all done a creditable job. If you thought Traffic Signal showed the plight of the beggars realistically, watch Naan Kadavul and you will be blown away. Let me tell you that some of the scenes are quite gory and not easy to watch. But therein is the power of the movie- it hits you hard and the effect remains with you for long. The visuals by Arthur.A.Wilson are of great standard and Jayamohan’s dialogues are of tremendous help to the movie. While I usally have a complaint that most tamil movies are not cosmopolitan, Bala has heard my plea & taken care of it. Characters speak in Hindi, Sanskrit and Malayalam band look genuine.
Ilayaraja has not let us down at all. While the songs are mostly relegated to the background and situational, he scores majorly with the background score. Pooja is sure to get noticed for her work and coming finally to Arya- I think he has really sunk into the character very well. Though he does not have too many dialogues to speak, he has done justice to his role. Having said all this if one was to ask me if this is a perfect movie and would it be tough for Bala to emulate this, I would say a loud no. The movie is definitely good and Bala needs to be credited for making such a bold movie, but there are a few points which I wish Bala had taken care of –
1. Editing by Suresh Urs looks haphazard at times- especially towards the climax.Certain scenes suddenly jump in & there is a lack of continuity.2. The movie has been given a U/A certificate but in spite of that the movie is too strong for children anyways. I wish Bala opted for an A certificate instead and asked the censors to retain some more portions which would have made the story more meaningful.3. For all the talk that the movie has generated about Arya’s Rudran and the boldness, Arya does not have all that much screen time in the movie.
But all said and done Bala has stuck to his conviction and the movie is a another landmark for Tamil Cinema.Though I am not sure as to whether the audiences would embrace it in en mass, I know that 2009 has began well for Tamil Cinema with Naan Kadavul.

Note-Originally published on PFC.Check it out here
http://passionforcinema.com/naan-kadavul-bala-is-back-in-style/

Movie Marketing- The Telugu Cinema Way

I’m just back home after watching a recently released, successfully running Telugu movie called Nachchavule. On the way home I kept thinking again & again about the movie. Well yes the movie is certainly decent enough to be thinking about, but more than the movie I was thinking more from the angle of the movie’s marketing. As a keen follower of Telugu cinema that’s when I realized that while at large Telugu movies are still caught in the trap of the so called stars and the big producers & directors with some few small film makers trying to also keep themselves afloat, but in terms of movie marketing, Telugu cinema seems to be heading in the right track.
I would hereafter discuss the same with the help of two recent movies as examples. Let’s take the case of Vinayakudu. Released on 22nd Nov, the movie is still going strong in most centres. Starring Sonia & Krishnudu, the movie had the story appearing very clear to the public in all the publicity aids used. Everybody knew the movie was a love story between a fat guy (Krishnudu) and a good looking girl (Sonia). So much so that the movie in line with the distributor’s (Big Cinemas) name made a bold tagline as A Big Fat Love Story.
As it is the movie directed by Sai Kiran Adivi, was fairly risky due to the concept. The only other instance of a hero in Indian movies being played by a fat character ( and which is still in public memory ) is Mohanlal’s Uncle Bun in Malayalam ( Rajendra Prasad did the telugu version ) and no I wont even discuss Anil Kapoor’s silly fat man act briefly in Badhai Ho Badhai. But to actually flaunt the concept proudly in the sweet & simple hoardings and posters was a brave attempt by Sai Kiran, Big Cinemas and the producer-Prem Kumar and it seems to have worked in their favour.
The movie has appealed to the youth and the family audience and has reached across to all sections of viewers. Today as the movie nears 50 days of its run, Sai Kiran Adivi has announced that he’s planning a sequel to the movie with the same lead pair. Now that’s certainly reaping the success which can be strongly attributed to the marketing done for the movie. Coming to Nachchavule the movie I saw a few hours back, it’s produced by the well known Usha Kiron Movies and directed by Ravi Babu.
Before the movie released posters of the movie were splashed all over A.P. But surprisingly the posters did not feature the lead pair- debutants Tanish and Madhavi Latha. In fact the public were completely in the dark about the lead pair. The posters had depicted either a cute pair of monkeys with ear phones or a couple of puppies. The posters did raise the curiosity of the people and they did throng the theatres in the very first week. Once the movie was accepted by the people in the first week, Usha Kiron Movies then unleashed the lead pair in all subsequent publicity aids including posters and trailers.
Another interesting aspect about Nachchavule is that the movie has been released with limited prints unlike the trend of flooding the market with a large number of prints as is the norm in the telugu film industry these days. This strategy has also worked in the favour of the movie makers, as the curiosity levels have only been increasing. It is now expected that Usha Kiron Movies will be slowly increasing the number of prints.
What is common to Vinayakudu & Nachchavule apart from the fact that both are small movies? Given below is the response to the question-
A very good product- at heart both the movies are simple romantic flicks which has the appeal to reach out to all sections of viewers. So a good product can be helped further by good marketing but expecting marketing alone to do the trick is not right.Marketing focus- people associated with both the movies knew that their product was good but it was a small movie. Hence they needed to connect to the audience and believed in the benefits of marketing.Clear Communication- they either had a strong tagline or communication aid and used it to the hilt in communicating the essence of the movie.Respecting the boundary- while both the marketing teams knew they had to have a strong promotional campaign for the movie, they knew that they shouldn’t go overboard and stuck to the boundary very well. They knew what would work for a Ghajini in hindi would probably not work for them and hence they didn’t go overboard.
With these two movies in the recent few weeks showing what good marketing can do a good movie, I hope Telugu Cinema takes the cue and looks at utilizing marketing in the right way for their movies.

Published originally on PFC- Check it out here-
http://passionforcinema.com/movie-marketing-the-telugu-cinema-way/