Singam Puli (2011)

‘Singam Puli’ as the title suggests pits twins against each other; there’s Shiva, an honest, crass fisherman and the other, Ashok, a lawyer who gets a high on deceiving people. Kollywood, once again exploits the dual role trick.

Full review -http://nowrunning.com/movie/6716/tamil/singam-puli/2991/review.htm

Nadunisi Naaygal (2011)

Similarities between Yudham Sei and Nadunisi Naaygal-
1.Psychopathic murderers.
2.Women get abused.
3.There’s a message.
4.At least a part of the story is narrated by a character in the film.

Differences between Yudham Sei and Nadunisi Naaygal-
1.Yudham Sei plays with your emotions; Nadunisi Naaygal doesn’t.
2.Yudham Sei is completely music driven; Nadunisi Naaygal is visceral and has no background score.
3.Yudham Sei starts preaching right from the very beginning; Nadunisi Naaygal tells you what the point of the film really was after the film is over.
4.Yudham Sei has characters that are either “good” or “bad”; Nadunisi Naaygal doesn’t judge its characters and treats them as individuals.
5.Yudham Sei is laden with a horribly contrived plot while Nadunisi Naaygal has no plot.
6.Yudham Sei has sociopaths working together (Mysskin, please do your research the next time) who react the same way to the same situation; Nadunisi Naaygal does a character study of a psychopath.
7.Yudham Sei has choreographed fight sequences; Nadunisi Naaygal keeps it real.
8.In Yudham Sei a bearded drunkard who has a bullet lodged in his stomach tells the story; the psychopath of Nadunisi Naaygal is narrating his story to a cop.
9.The cinematography is solely for the purpose of catching your attention in Yudham Sei, in Nadunisi Naaygal it is used with authenticity.
10.The actors in Yudham Sei could’ve been replaced by pieces of wood; the lead actor in Nadunisi Naaygal digs deep and gets into the psyche of the character.
11.Yudham Sei tells you to kill anyone who checks you out when you’re changing in the dressing room, Nadunisi Naaygal tells you that victims of child abuse are unable to move on and need serious attention.
12.Yudham Sei gets 0/10 from me, Nadunisi Naaygal gets 8/10.

I don’t have to tell you which one to watch.

Yudham Sei (2010)

The general consensus of Yudham Sei: “An edge of the seat thriller.” I agree with the choice of words. I was actually on the edge of my seat contemplating on walking out of the theatre. That was thrilling, compared to the film.

Yudham Sei is self-indulgent pretentious garbage that I wouldn’t watch even if I was to get paid for it. Homeless beggars would rather sleep on the streets than sleep in an air-conditioned theatre that screens the film. Director Mysskin has tried too hard to make a powerful film by playing with the audience’s emotions. With the film he shocks, provokes, inserts twists, milks sentiment as and when he wishes.

The lead character is J.Krishnamoorthy. He runs fast, he takes on eight people with a penknife and wears leather shoes. The man is labeled as a “good” guy. That’s how the central character of the film is written. He has hardly any depth. All you know is that he is “the best police officer” and that he wants to find his kidnapped sister. How are we to understand him and his wants? He is glorified by making every other character around him seem insensitive. This is the limit of Mysskin’s talent. He might be able to capture and invert beautiful shots of cobwebs, cardboard boxes, watermelons, snakes, skies, lampposts and water, in various colors of light, but a consummation of all that doesn’t qualify as a film. It’s no more than a power point presentation of google image search results.

You know right from the beginning that it’s a talented crew and they could be good at what they do. Unfortunately, they’re in the wrong hands. Mysskin uses them in all the wrong ways. He has an eye for detail but not the honesty of an artist. He goes to the extent of making a direct reference to Rashomon by using the film’s name. It wasn’t a tribute or a token of appreciation; it was a shameless attempt at letting the audience know that he’s someone with international exposure to films. As if we’ve forgotten about him not giving credit to the original material that Nandalala was adapted from. Mysskin has low self esteem, he doesn’t have faith in his script and therefore he tries to get the music to drive the film. Newcomer K certainly has talent but it’s the truth, everyone has to start at the bottom.

The screenplay is laughable. It’s so horribly contrived. Half the story is narrated by a nearly dead man who laughs and drinks despite having two bullets lodged in his intestine. The characters keep doing things that are out of character. Mysskin, the director should never hire Mysskin, the screenwriter again. From Mysskin’s films, it’s pretty obvious that he’s a film-maker only because he wants to be one, not because he enjoys making films. It’s shabbily overdone and the visual metaphors just make it worse. Yudham Sei is like eating a burger filled with just mayonnaise. You’re going to feel like throwing up. I could write another thousand words about why the film sucks so hard, but I’m going to spare you of that. It’s poison. Stay away from it.

Rating – 0/10