I should blame it all on the change in my office shift timings. I moved myself to a semi-night shift to support a project and it had its own devastating effects this weekend. I was not able to get a proper sleep this weekend and I instantly agreed when Anand, Hari and Sriram roped me in for a movie outing (night show) at Mayajaal. Vidhi valiyadhu!! (Fate is not just hard, it is painful :) an intended word pun)
It was all set, Screen 2 - 2200 hrs. Movie: Velayudham.
I am still cursing myself why I took this decision to 'watch' the movie. This is the third ever Vijay movie I saw in a theatre - first one was a good one 'Poove Unakkaga', second (tickets courtesy: Anand) ATM in Sathyam Cinemas (another useless, except for the Maduraikku song). This movie, in all counts, should be worse than Aadhi, Suraa, Kuruvi, Vettaikkaran and Thiruppachi put together. Raja, the director, is worse than the mighty Perarasu himself (no worse insult is required).
Over to the bloopers section (can also be termed as review):
1. Poor guy, the main villain Home Minister, is taken off to Pak-Afghan border by terrorists - nobody in TN including the CM seems to be concerned about it. He still wears a standard White Shirt, White Veshti in Khyber pass - could not imagine at all :) On the top of it, he talks in a 500/- worth second hand Karbonn mobile phone - lol.
2. The first 30 minutes of the movie has more number of murders / killings than what Tamil cinema has scored in the last 10 years put together - the director should be made aware that the watching audience should also be part of the count, we suffer more than the victims.
3. How can a lady, who has suffered a 'kuthu' in her abdomen (which normally villain's gundas would not survive), gets to write in legible handwriting in Tamil (remember she is a journalist) that would have for sure fetched a 'Neat & V. Good with A*' in school, write a super essay on the back of a cinema poster which had no gum and then survive for the next 20 reels? She is also seen as a magnanimous creature who shares a light moment with Vijay after he pushes and opens the trial room door instead of lodging a complaint in All-Women Police Station in T. Nagar!
4. All usual Vijay-isms are there in the movie (an overdose??) - running sequence during introduction, jumping and catching a moving train/car/aeroplane, thangachchi sentiment, camera shaking as if taken during a seismic attack, Vijay will jump - pause for a moment (as if to see whether his pant is still hanging in his waist) and kick the villain or his gunda while the victim is destined to just wait and watch, song-fight-punch dialogue-song-fight-punch dialogue --- till eternity.
5. Train matters - lots of food for me!! It is only those rail matters and Santhanam's comedy that kept me awake all along. WDG-3A #14661 GOC is the first visitor, Vijay is shown as taking this NESL 2S train to Chennai. Boards show as Chennai-Salem, I suppose this is Vriddachalam-Salem branch line, but entire railway sequence is taken in East Coast Rly territory (if my analysis is right, it should be the scenic Kottavalasa - Kirandul line near Waltair). When the chain pull happens, the TTE instead of the Guard attends the problem! He even has a reservation chart and pad in his hands (Gajendran). The loco gets changed enroute to WDM-2S #17395 ex-VSKP now-TNP, clearly marked (and visible in the screen too) as 'Not fit for Passenger Service' - rofl. He travels in a 2S coach and tries to locate his lost luggage in a Sleeper coach. Eppudi kedaikkummm??? (Update: he indeed travels in SL, correction courtesy: Sriram KS)
6. 'Mann'mohan Singh is a mokkey comedy piece! Kozhi sentiment scenes made us feel 'when will this end?'
7. First song, 'sonnaa puriyadhu' is a copy of his earlier piece 'nee endha ooru' from Sachin. This is shot in T. Vadippatti in Theni district, data available in the band vaadhyam that they have leased for shooting. Second song, chillax is very nice - I liked it. 'Molachu moonu ela' is a clear copy paste of 'paththukkulla number' from VR MBBS.
8. MD of a TV company calls his employee's mobile number from office land line, hard to believe - can't he afford his own mobile bill, idhu Blackberry yugam :)
9. One (of the many) big logical vacuum in the script is where the HM is not pursuing after Pandiarajan even after he announces in a public TV show that he was the only person who saw Velayudham. The chase sequence at Egmore is ridiculous - where did the rug sack go (koanippai)? How was he able to climb the stairs and go to Dinathanthi end of the Foot Over Bridge where a ramp is... Nobody is called as a witness, nobody has 'seen' Velayudham who steals a bike in broad daylight, no drawings of face to identify him... I can just quote my brother Anand, "indha maadhiri padam edukkarthuku romba dhairiyam venumda".
10. My office campus RMZ appears in one scene. That song sequence somehow resembled (Enthiran + Ra.One)/2.
11. Popular Tamil cinema cliches are not extinct - you have to sneeze when you wear a new dress to camouflage and act as a statue, anyone who rolls out more than average punch and sentiment dialogues in a given sequence has to die (in our film, it is Raghav), hero asks (dumb a**) heroine #1 to select dress for (matter) heroine #2, train stops just before the boiler cylinder (btw - he applies the brakes correctly), chit funds cheat with one appaavi dying hearing that news (in old movies it used to be Stock exchange crash news aired through telephone), villains are supposed to shout daaaai, daai in 8-1/2 sruthi and import ammunition in broad daylight near Besant Nagar beach - nobody will notice even when the Home Minister is standing there to receive the package!
12. A poor WDM-2 #17692 that will struggle with a 12 coach load to reach 60 kmph is shown to reach 200 kmph with full load :) the speedometer looks like a Pulsar's - ayyo ayyo ungalaiyelaam nenachaa enaku paavama iruku! This is once shown as hauled by a WAP-4 electric loco too... Is it really Pushpathur? Has GC reached there so soon?? ED 3D #11201 hauls the return passenger of his maapley.
13. Lock-up suicide case goes unnoticed... I thought the drama around Hansika will be a repeat of Vaidehi Kaathirundhaal, luckily Genelia reveals the plot to her and she is saved.
14. Everyone in the (cricket) stadium is able to hear a teenage girl's shout of "avaru velayudham ileenga!", HM organises such a big event in a cricket stadium with so much publicity without the knowledge of the CM - no police or security personnel (even for medicine) to control/stop villains gundaas closing the gates or bringing in bombs - dei, neengalaam thirundhavey maatteengalada??
15. Ultimate piece is where Vijay is ripped of his shirt to show his supposed-to-be-six-packs, I counted and it came to only three-and-a-half. He then goes on to deliver moral of the story for 15 minutes like a 'Moral Education cum Yoga master' teacher.
16. Patience is tested, we all thought we were relieved when the train stopped - it did not, we all then thought we were relieved when they return for thangachi kalyanam - it did not, finally we all thought we were relieved when the stadium scene arrived - it did not!!!
17. One frank question to director - what happened to those 100+ gundas who went into the AVM studio set floor and were locked by Pandiarajan?
Yappaaa mudila da saamy! My mobile phone showed '8-messages long' as I finished typing just hints for writing this blog (while watching the movie). It is not Velayudham, it is Soolayudham - three pronged killing - Vijay, the director Raja and the three ladies in the movie.
Add-ins (gained during post movie discussion with the boys):
18. Cricket stadium has X-BOX game poster enlarged and pasted
19. Director Raja himself will laugh when he gets to see the movie once
20. Cliches - why are time bombs made user friendly? Why should there be an 'off' button at all if it is intended to burst?? And for heaven's sake why do all time bombs show remaining time before bursting as if it is a movie download through utorrent???
2 comments:
KS Sriram has provided a long list of items to clarify. His points and my comments:
1. Murders in 30 minutes -
The one to be blamed is Censor board for the "U" certificate & not the director. And there are lots of other Tamil movies which has more murders / killings than this.
## This also includes murdering the audience, poor people!
2. Gum -
Have you seen when posters are pasted on walls? I’ve seen many times during school days.. The gums are pasted on the corners and the center of the poster, leaving some portions without gum..
## Have to agree - still pulling a poster out of a *lorry* and writing in a ball point pen is hard to explain and understand.
3. MD's phone -
There is no hard and fast rule that MD should speak using his mobile only.. When he has the landline connection and if he pays all his bills properly, he has all his rights to use his landline phone.. And the scene doesn’t depict that he was at some other place / room and purposely coming to his cabin to make landline call.. He was sitting in his cabin and making the landline call..
## As people climb up, they tend to make the best use of technology, plus dialing a stored number in mobile is easy compared to dialing a mobile number of a new employee from landline.
3. Saree sentiment -
He didn’t ask Jenelia to select the dress. He just ask her to give the dress to Hansika..
## This is a popular cliche of tamil cinema, hero takes heroine no 1 to buy stuff for heroine no 2 where he gives out the message that he is in love with the latter, while former 'adakkifies' her kanneer and says saree/pottu/daps/whatever will be good for her (colour).
4. Egmore -
“The chase sequence at Egmore is ridiculous - where did the rug sack go (koanippai)? How was he able to climb the stairs and go to Dinathanthi end of the Foot Over Bridge where a ramp is.”
Watch the scene again without typing hints. The “koanippai” was on the bike.
## Konippai is there in the bike. I stand corrected. However, the other point still holds good.
5. Stadium security -
In the scene prior to the stadium scene, HM orders the police saying “ Velayuthatha paka latcha kanakana per varuvanga, ellarum avana pakra verioda irupanga, athanala yarum nan solar varaikum entha action um eduka kudathu”.. Namma oor police action edu nu sonale thunguvanga, HM ae action ethvm venanu sonathuku aprm???
## hard to believe that HM does all these in public view without CM's blatant intervention. Lakhs of people without proper protection? Could not imagine at all. Possible only in Vijay movies.
6. 6 packs -
Did Vijay ever tell anyone that he has six packs? Or did the producer / director announce that Vijay will appear with 6 packs in this movie?? He has started working out to get 6 packs for his new project with Gautham..
## I mentioned 'supposed-to-be'. It means the same thing that you have mentioned above.
7. Deleted comment -
And I also would like to know what “Sankara subramaniam” has commented..!! ;)
## He deleted it even before I read it! It seems he wrote "your review was worse than the movie" hten changed his mind as it would be a misstatement of facts (it is indeed movie is worse!)
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