Ghajini -

Please click here for the Hindi Ghajini review

Last week, I ended a six month streak of not watching a movie in a theatre. I saw Ghajini. This 'review' (nice name, eh?) will not divulge the story. You can safely go on.

I was pretty much attracted towards the movie because of various reasons: the director Murugadoss's previous two movies, Harris Jeyaraj, Surya and of course Asin. It has become a habit in Tamil cinema, or Indian cinema, that if a movie gets a lot of hype, invariably it fails to impress. Is Ghajini an exception? Feels bad to say, but it is not.

After a relatively good screenplay (what's direction?, I dont know) in both his earlier movies, Murugadoss has bungled the last half hour - 45 minutes. Even an erstwhile assistant of Balachander, whom his sisters believe is better than Maniratnam, would have done better. The first half was far better than the second, both in terms of the fluent pace and lucid details. I heard somewhere that Murugadoss has spent more than 1 year in preparation for this movie, I pity him.

Surya, I guess, is the only hero in Tamil Film Industry who gets support from each row of the movie audience, fails big time to reveal his acting prowess. After an impeccable performance in Kaakka Kaakka, any Tom, Jerry and Selva would expect a better show from him. If I have not seen Nanda, I might have rated Surya better, but as it stands, his characterisation reminds me of Nanda. Most of the time, he reminded us about his good performance in Nanda.

Asin, aah aah, full marks. As I am a theeviravaathi of Asin, do not expect any negative comment about her. She had a completely different role from her earlier movie. She has done really well in her "role", an extreme rarity in Tamil cinema. Many other actresses would have emulated Jyothika in the "Kalpana's" role, but Asin has done well not to create that impression.

Harris Jeyaraj has impressed in two of the songs: "Oru maalai pani vizhum naram" and "Sutrum vizhi sudarey". These two songs are outstanding. This does not mean the other songs are bad. I would rate them as "Good". BTW, I dont know how to rate BGM.

The nemesis of Ghajini is Nayanthra. Nayanthra should have restricted herself to sarees and never ever dream of wearing any thing else. It was disgusting to see her on screen. Especially the scenes where she runs, you would understand why she should wear only sarees! I hope not to see any other movie in which Nayanthra runs/dances.

This Ghajini might have succeeded the first time itself, but I would say it is not a deserving victory.