2 / 4 STARS
DIRECTOR: R. PARTHIPAN
ACTORS: R. PARTHIPAN, VIKRAM
ACTRESSES: VIKRAM, SUVALAKSHMI, JAYANTI
MUSIC DIRECTOR: ILAYARAJA
STORYLINE:
A great idea for a movie that could have been equally great. Parthipan plays Ayya, a respected man who runs a cinema theater. The story begins when bombs are placed inside the theater during a movie. Surya and Rattan play police officers who want to defuse the bombs without letting the audience know. Vikram (who would amaze viewers in "Sethu" later this year) plays a man inside the theater, and Suvalakshmi the woman outside who loves him. Ayya's ex-wife (played by Jayanti) does not help when she makes a tear- filled request to him to evacuate the theater, against the police's advice. By the time Ayya makes a decision, however, Suvalakshmi has snuck in and warned Vikram; others, hearing her words, begin to run out of the theater. Panic ensues as everyone makes a mad dash for the door. Roja plays a reporter, Raman a secretary.
COMMENTS:
Parthipan has presented himself in a different light than his usual tongue-in-cheek humor style and though he tries, Tamil movies are not English movies. The movie moves at a snail's pace (it would have made a heck of a half-hour T.V. special instead), and boredom, more than tension, sets in with the REAL movie-going audience. It isn't a great movie, but it doesn't deserve the box office flop it received, either.
One of the highlights is how the eventual demise of Ayya takes place.
NOTE ON THE MUSIC:
Ilayaraja does the absolute least expected of him for this one. Nothing even slightly memorable.
RECOMMENDATION:
Watch it on video.
VIJAY VANNIARAJAN