A trusted auditor (Munishkanth) who turns rowdy. Seenu (Jiiva), who runs a guest house in Kashi. His grandmother who mixes laxatives in guests’ drinks, and a sister who picks smashed white pumpkin and broken coconuts off the road. Raghu (Jai) is out there trying to kill his father, an ascetic, because he’s frustrated that he left him to handle the family. There’s a conman who’s swindled both Seenu and Raghu of money. There’s a helper at the guest house, and Sugar, a dog who loves swiping articles to hide under the staircase. A wide array of characters in just the first five minutes of the movie.
I wonder how Sundar C managed to carry these many characters in his head during the shoot, and yet manage to give all of them an intro worth a few laughs, and a decent exit too. The procession of actors never ceases. There’s Radha Ravi, Robo Shankar, Madhusudhan Rao, Kajal Pasupathi, Sathish, Shiva, Catherine Tresa, Nikki Galrani, Singampuli, VTV Ganesh, Yogi Babu…
The story is not exactly wafer-thin, and there are three main strands that the director focuses on. The politician waiting to get back a laptop containing incriminating documents from his auditor, a man out to sell his ancestral property in Kashi, and a brother trying to get his sister married, and also find love on the side. The sub-plots include a family adopting a con as its heir, and a fake swami who loves all things women.
Jiiva is a livewire on screen, and the camera loves him, as it has over the years. Jai has been through a bad patch recently, but here, he fits the role of an anxious Raghu well. A film that relies on humour can definitely write better character arcs for its women. They fret and pout, preen, and do little else. It’s a little hard to imagine Nikki as a Thasildar by day and a dance teacher by evening. PS: The dancing is quite graceless.
Despite being a comedy, the film quite deserves its UA tag. Some risqué dialogues still manage to bring in the laughs, but in the midst of the frothy one-liners that never stop, the camera takes the time to go up, close and personal with the leading ladies. The sister is spared the horror, though, as is expected.
Cinematographer UK Senthil Kumar has painted the screen in all colours of the rainbow. Pinks and blues dominate, and while it is vibrant, you do crave for some monotone moments. Hip Hop Aadhi scores some peppy numbers, including a take-off on the ancient ‘Krishna Mukunda Murari’. Srikanth has had a happy time with the scissors, never letting you linger too long on a single scene. Works for a film like that, where pace matters most.
The elaborate sequence in the railway station can get dreary, but the team keeps pulling rabbits out of the hat and does not really leave you with a minute to think. You do wonder why some characters behave the way they do, but trying to pick holes in a Sundar C film is wrong. The director, who has given us gems in the past, is renowned for cinema that somehow gets you to laugh. And, he’s done it admirably over the past many years.
Recommended
If you want to watch a film for just the laughs, this is a definite bet, and has hit written all over it. You feel light and happy while leaving the theatre, despite the incredulousness of it all. Others have a lot to learn from the director who knows how to make someone who cringes at body shaming and sexist jokes, laugh. That calls for some ability. And, it is also probably why when you leave the theatre, you see a lot of popcorn on the ground — it’s difficult to make a choice between a buttery tub and laughter.
*****
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