Few movies I saw and my feedback (I am not here to argue, just my feedback!)

Mozhi - Good. Comparitively exceptional (my review below will give you an idea)

Kalluri - WASTE OF TIME. Reviews else where are good to average. There is no story, no message. I would no avoid Balaji Sakthivel's movies. I will try may be 1 or 2 more before I give him up.

Bheema - HORRIBLE. One more director (Lingusamy) to avoid and if Vikram repeat these kind of movies (Vijay does and I dont watch his movies, no matter what) one more actor to avoid.

Billa - WASTE OF TIME. Its commercial hit. This movie proves that some one can take a classic hit (DON (Amitabh) / Billa (Rajini)) and make it worst. DON (SRK) is far far far better. Another director (Vishnuvardan) no the "ignore list"

Malaikottai - HORRIBLE. SORRY NO MORE COMMENTS


Now a days, anyone can become an director and they all have 1 story (mostly stolen from elsewhere) to launch their madness and they become celebrities and kill the industry and the taste of audiance. I was thinking of listing all WORST directors here and came up with GOOD/AVERAGE directors instead (so far).

1. Cheran (Autograph, TT, Mayakannadi all are classic, irrespective of commercial success)
2. Thangar Bachchan (his subjects are extremely good, but presentation is raw)
3. Bala (yet to recover from pithamagan effect)
4. Shankar (commercial entertainer)
5. Prakashraj Productions (No matter who the director is, Prakashraj has good taste for movies and didnt fail so far)
6. Manirathnam
7. Gowtham Menon (Copy cat, but still okay)
8. Selvaraghavan

Rest of the directors have to be judged based on individual movies and move them to ignore list.

My ignore list so far

1. Vijay movies
2. All the directors who director vijay from the movie Perarasu upto now
3. Lingusami - run is the only average movie, that too a copy of hindi movie (Hrithik's second movie, dont know the name)
4. Seeman - another one movie show and now garbage.
5. Ameer - unfortunately a celebrity and a "classic" director. Enough of his sickness. No more

I hope they see movies like Chake De or Taare Zameen Par and decide to quit making movies. This is good for tamil industry.

Tamil movies corrupt people's mind and dont know what is good and they end up selecting only bad. This starts with movies and end in politics!

Kaadhal was very good, so I'm surprised to hear the critical drubbing that Kalloori is receiving.

Evano Oruvan was also disappointing, though it had some good points.

Kalloori is just my opinion. So many (Super Good)films have come with same theme (boys and gals can/can not? be friends and dont have to fall in love). Director doesnt know how to end, so he didnt conclude the movie. Poor guys, they took 3/5 from SIFY and converting to 60 marks and giving false ad. 60 marks in Vikatan/Kumudam standard is 4+ stars or more. Only few movies (Devar Magan, Nayagan) got them. Shankar is doing all these tricks to make money inspite of not spending any money at all. Stupid!

Evano Oruvan - Madan was going gaga over it and finally gave 2*. Probably good theme/attempt but poor direction/screenplay.

Mirugam - Madan was going gaga over it and gave 4*. So there is some hope and on my wish list to see.

Movies I wanted to see

Pallikoodam - Thankar Batchan
9 roopai nottu - Thankar Batchan
Migrugam - Sami. Debut. Movie got excellent reviews.

Last but not least, went to Mozhi with HIGH expectation and though it didnt meet my expectation 3 weeks back, now it looks like an excellent movie, thanks to Bheema!

I would add Goutham Menon to the list of crap directors. I was watching trailers of Surya's upcoming movie, and realized immediately that it is going to be crap-----menon.

I watched Deeppavali. If there is a special edition where you trim the film by 30 mins, it would be much better, as it is a decent entertainer with good songs and respective videos. I don't have much expectations from Bheema as well, other than creative music vids. I was planning on watching Bheema at the theaters, but I'll wait for the DVD

I recently watched a Telugu movie "Jagadam" - every frame is a visual feast, with a satirical presentation of "violence". At first, it feels like a typical southern macho man film, but slowly develops into something else. Worth a watch. The DVD by Tolly2Holly is on par with the best Ayngaran releases.

Any news on Bala's projects?

I admire and respect you for this brave attempt!



I am expecting this too much as well, both as IR fan and Bala fan! Expected on April 14th.

Well, now that April 14th is not official Tamil New Year (CM in TN has enough time to research this!), may be Bala will stick to his word and release on Jan 15th 2009!

Other films I am expecting

Dasavatharam - Kamal - ARR/Himesh - Potential 2008 (Latest, Himesh ditched and ARR helping Kamal, getting hey ram feeling?)
Rajni - P Vasu - Vidyasagar - Unnamed movie, expected in late 08
Marmayogi - Kamal - ARR - Walt Disney Production - Expected in early 09
Robot - Rajni - Shankar - ARR - Eros - Ayngaran - 2010

Marudhanayagam - Whenever it releases, or worst case, documentary of what has been done so far.

Thanks
Balaji

I'm usually disappointed in whatever Kamal writes and/or directs, but his films always have an interesting aspect to them so they are worth watching.

I hear the Rajini-P.Vasu film is called Kuselan, and that GV Prakash will do the music.

Hmm... GVP didnt impress me at all. He has lot of ARR hangover. Same with Joshua Sridhar as well. These kids get so much visibility now a days (thanks to media) that with just 1 or 2 movies, they look like rocking star! Speaking of music in TFM, its horrible again. With IR, ARR, Deva and VS not in "active" tfm, its Yuvan vs the rest. Yuvan is coming up with 1 or 2 surprises here and there, but otherwise not many fresh tunes/innovation. HJ... man he copies his own songs. May be he has memory loss! All others are not worth mentioning.

So, TF is in worst shape now. Looks like TF fans will switch to Hindi, like the did in late 60s or early 70s.

Today is nothing like the glory days of the late 70s to late 90s, with IR and ARR. Even IR does mostly crap films in Tamil these days, and ARR has done some dud films in Tamil in the 2000s. ATM songs were alright, but nothing I would listen to in a few years. Then again who is making Tamil films that would inspire good songs? Hopefully ARR's upcoming Sakkarakatti will be another Boys/Kadhal Desam kind of sensation.

Marudhanayagam footage (with some bits of Virumaandi, for some reason.

I've heard Chennai 600028 and Oram Po were not bad. I don't know if those are on DVD yet.

I just read on Indiaglitz that Ajith will be doing a remake of the Sivaji Ganesan film Puthiya Paravai. Too many remakes of old films in Tamil these days.

Puthiya Paravai was a good thriller. Hopefully they will do justice to the movie.

Recently watched "4 Killadigal" in Vijay TV (B&W, JayShankar, Suruli Rajan, Manohar, Thengai Srinivasan). Was really surprised. Very good comedy movie. Its about 4 thieves who decides to make a movie and make a decent/normal living. Excellent comedy, nice story, little bit of romance, bit thriller and a good climax. Surprised that Kamal didnt remake this. Very good candidate for remake, since no body would have watched this when it was released!

BTW perfect movie for Priyadharshan to make in Hindi. I could think of Akshay (JayShankar), Paresh (Manohar) and couple of other comedians!

Sounds like an interesting film. I could not find any place to get it except Anytamil.com, which has the VCD for an astonishing $19.99.

I agree that 2007 has been a very disappointing year for Tamil Cinema - except for Parutheveeran (which in itself is far from perfect) i can’t see any other film that stands up to get noticed.

In all honestly i have not see a single film from the "Thankar Bachan family" - so can’t comment on those.

** spoiler for kallori**

As for Kallori - i found it to be an innocently irritating at least it started that way and meandered into a climax that puts a full-stop to whatever happened so far. Once the climax unfolded and erased (in a flash) all the “innocence” you have to sit-up and wonder what wrong these kids did. That alone was the strength and most probably the crux of the movie. For the first two hours I was frustrated to the level of walking off the movie, but the climax more than makes up for it.

Balaji Sakthivel seems to have found a style that he can rightfully call his own (atleast in Tamil cinema) – just like Kadhal he continues to trust the story more than the stars (non-professional actors). The sore point of the movies are the song placements (he should simply avoid it), the lackluster dialogs, excessive melodrama among other things. Unfortunately I felt the “bad” things far outweigh the “good” things in Kallori and you start to sense perhaps the director is under pressure from the success he tasted with his earlier film (Kadhal). Though disappointed I am still looking forward to his films in the future.

Unlike Tamil, our Hindi counterparts were far better in 2007 – No Smoking, Johnny Gadar, Manorama (all noir based subjects though !)