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bharani123
Reviews
Neethaane En Ponvasantham (2012)
One of the best Tamil movies I have seen!
I started watching with zero expectations, but went ahead due to Gautam Sir and Raja Sir. What an excellent magic they created! I've read all criticisms for this movie; while I respect others' opinions, I perceive motion pictures from the concept of impact they have on our lives - do we visualize ourselves as the characters? do we enjoy as one-time watch? This film scores very high on my book because of 3 pillars:
(1) Gautam Sir and Raja Sir: Strength of this movie is its narration. People've called it slow, but Gautam Sir paced and sequenced the situations perfectly. Raja Sir's songs were, as usual, excellent with perfect placements (Na Muthu Kumar's lyrics were wonderful and fused very well with music).
(2) Subtle nuances of the emotions felt at different stages of life by the lead pair: Gautam's direction in even tiny spots is evident (when Varun asks Nithya out for coffee and Nithya rejoices, when Nithya shows her frustrations in between 'Mudhal Murai' song sequence, Nithya's defiance in Manappadu).
(3) Fantastic acting from Jiiva and Samantha (I became a big Samantha fan after this): Jiiva played his part beautifully (calm nature in school, college and in climax scene) and could've been given more prominence, but I'll accept Gautam's narration. Samantha scored really big in 2 situations - (i) adolescent Nithya in school getting upset quickly shouting at Varun and breaking up (ii) mature Nithya being stubborn in Manappadu but not able to bear the thought of Varun marrying someone else and breaking down in the end.
Other characters are nothing but strength: Santhanam, Vidyullekha, Harish Ragavendar and so on.
The only real blemish was bad cinematography in the most critical scene - before interval: instead of close up, full scene was shot from high angle, greatly reducing the emotional intensity and effectiveness of the scene. In addition, the good times Varun and Nithya shared could've been expanded a little (like the tiny moment of happiness in between 'Kaatrai Konjam' song).
Despite these, movie will live in people's hearts because of the emotional roller coaster in a not-so-dramatic narration. One suggestion: please do not watch this movie if you are looking for action or high drama, leading to perfect climax with a bang; none of these will be present.
Dasavatharam (2008)
One of the best embryo formed in Kamal's wombs
If you watch Tamil "mass-appeal" movies regularly, you will fall in love straightaway. I was little disappointed since I expected Kamal's ideas all over, but the commercial elements doused the brilliant concept that Kamal unveiled throughout the movie.
Concept - The very concept was interpolating Chaos theory into the projection of 10 avatharams in modern spectrum. Th message will be revealed only if you choose to ignore the usual funny stuff - songs, fights, and loquacious blurbs.
Conceptualization - Our brain has to be a NASCAR driver to follow every situation, the meaning (or the avatharam portrayed) of each character of Kamal, process the information and then decide the message he wanted to give! The movie starts in a hurry and ends in a hurry. Portion of the viewing pleasure was lost because of the incessant and sometimes annoying delivery of dialogues.
Songs - As usual, they are garbage and unnecessary for the pace of the movie and have been simply stowed in for appealing to mass audiences.
I am giving a 7 because the concept was brilliant but the presence of commercial elements make it unappealing.
Stepmom (1998)
One of the best of Susan Sarondon
Susan Sarondon makes an indelible mark in this movie like she always does. Though the movie seemingly captured the emotional difficulties of Julia's rather than Susan's character, I felt it was the emotional toughness of Susan that binds this entire movie together. The movie's centerpiece is the relationship between the two women, but Ed Harris's character could have been given little more prominence; I felt he went through the turmoil more than the two women combined. Julia is strong yet vulnerable; she shows her resolve to win over the children's hearts more than once, and she does.
But ultimately, it is Susan who scores over. Every time Anna and Ben (her children) look up to her, she sets an example of how a mother should be. In the opening scene, when she says "I'll handle it from here", it becomes clear that she is going to handle the film as well. When she discloses her illness to her children, Anna goes wild that Susan didn't tell her earlier, but Susan knows that she'll eventually accept it. Despite all her toughness, she shows she is one among us by accepting her fear that her children might forget her. Finally she knows that her children are ready to accept Isabel (Julia), so she accepts her as well.
I won't accept Susan's character any other way.