Jun 18, 2007

If I were in Shankar's team..


hmm.. not that he invited me, but I would have at least put forward the ideas in the next para. I can't believe that, despite the involvement of so many directors (Shankar, Balaji Shakthivel, KV Anand, JD and Jerry), many scenes sounded amateurish.. With my miniscule brain's limited cinema knowledge and logic, lemme think:

Rajni's profession: To be able to earn Rs. 200 crore (~$50M) in 20 years, I am sure it is not possible by doing any 'job' in US. When Vadivukkarasi asks him in the car, it is certainly meant to tell 'us' what he did, rite? I donno anything about 'Software Systems Architect'; but that doesn't sound big enough to make one save this much.. A far better option would have been to own a software company, or atleast a unique website portal.. U software people, lemme know if I am wrong.. Is this too much to ask from Sujata, who is a tech geek?

Ballelakka song: It suddenly jumps at you, out of nowhere, from inside a pub. Just 1/2 more min. would have been enough to show that Rajni is visiting his native village or 'kuladheivam' and then the song starts. And I am not even mentioning about a couple more days of practice to improve his dance steps.

Shriya wooing technique: Anything else would have better than the whole technique. Who would lock an adult daughter in a house, along with two suspicious strangers? They could have just locked themselves from inside? I know it is a small thing, but makes sense, no?

Bringing the black money out: Did Rajni and Vivek have that kinda power to assemble the auditors, drivers and servants of all the industrial bigwigs under one roof? Foolish to assume that the auditors would succumb to revealing their clients' information if beaten up by some goondas. How about this? Rajni being tech-savvy, writes a super program which enters the PC's of all the industrialists and their auditors, copies all the data and sends him.. By the time Rajni writes such a program, Vivek collects all their address, and by bugging the BSNL's main server, they are able to send the virus to the PC's in those addresses.. An inspiration from the climax of Independence day, but hey, why not introduce this kinda techniques to Tamil audience?

Transfer of hunderds of millions of rupees and dollars: One Muslim 'Bhai' staying in one 'kurukku sandhu' would be able to do such a monumental transaction? As a corollary to my previous point, the money transaction could be completely on-line, from the industrialists' a/c to Rajni's Swiss bank a/c, to his US a/c, and finally to his friends.

Shriya saving Rajni: True, trains will stop if anything 'red' is waved at them.. but Shreya manages to run towards the train, between the rails, holding the thaavani, but still the train manages to stop a few feet in front of her. At that speed, wouldn't the driver have managed to see a man standing mid-track and stop it, anyway? It would have made sense, if Rajni is standing at such a place that the driver can't see him (say, after a turn) and then Shriya is waving red at the train at the linear path, before the curve and makes it stop.

Climax fight: Even if you assume that Suman is storing all his money in that 'auspicious' place, wouldn't it all be in bundles, and stapled? How can they all fly as individual currency, oh, bcos Rajni is fighting? And when the whole floor is filled with 1000's and 500's, why are all the students (esp. the 'capitation fee collecting' kid) catch them mid-air? The whole thing could have been compressed to just the fight by the Mottai boss, which would have been more than enough, without the currency flying effect.

Shankar is known to take care of such minute details usually (e.g., Nasser asks Vikram in 'Anniyan' about where Remo manages to get money to spend a lot for wooing Sada, and Vikram gives a reasonable answer). I think that's what made him stand apart from other directors. God only knows what happened in 'Sivaji'.

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

This review is so kiddish. I was laughing out so loud as I was reading it.

Anonymous said...

i agree wiht all your logical questions raju, but i just feel pretty much everyone wanted to capitalize on rajni's appearance, and he knows it well too. comeon, he gets paid tons of money for a movie that is full of cgi, and he rarely does any hardwork, the people watch the movie for him. so i guess, it does not matter which geniuses work together, they all just wanted to make a movie and make money out of it. seriously, i felt even anniyan was mediocre, it wasn't great. shankar's earlier movies were good, but he just uses the same pattern in all his movies, and puts some kind of social cause into it. i haven't watched sivaji yet, but i didn't think it was going to be path breaking story or anything even if its shankar and sujatha, i just want to watch it for rajni, his style and the richness that shankar provides to the movie. shankar is not a great director, he is overhyped, he spends tons and tons of money to make it rich, but doens't care much for the story. whereas, kamal takes the utmost care to make a logical movie most of the time, but it fails to make an impact with the audience.what makes me mad is, rajni's personal life, he puts forth a simple appearance, then why ask for such a humongous sum for his movie, first we need to take the money he has made in this movie alone and throw it in the air

tt_giant said...

classic case of what could have been!

software architect: very generic term. perhaps he might have earned if he had sold his idea to google (like youtube). quite possible.

dont even start on balleilakka.. i hated the choreography.. adhiradi must have been the intro song.

hawala: all those sequences have been mercilessly mis-edited. must have taken more care. is it too late to re-do some scenes? i am just asking innocently..

money on top: hmm.. true.. could have chosen a better spot.

BTW, the train driver stopped the train seeing Shriya('s).. not red or anything.. he was color blind, actually.

all true.. but mottai boss is mottai boss. what to do??

Anonymous said...

Bill Gates is the Chief Software Architect of Microsoft. You guys got any problem with that.

Anonymous said...

u left SP Muthuraman out.

The movie sucks, amongst the worst movies in tamil cinema made in recent times.

Raju said...

Anon1, this is not the review, but my previous post is.. Anyway, good that it made u laugh.. :)
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Nitin, it is just the matter of demand vs bargaining power. Pretty much like our Indian cricket board.. they charge big amount from everyone who has something to do with cricket.. Similarly, AVM knows the saleability of Rajni; Rajni knows that AVM is not a non-profit organization; neither it is bankrupt or something - some of its previous movies, like Perazhagan and Gemini were big hits. So, he charges the highest price from them possible. Every extra money that the audience pay to watch the movie in its first week almost entirely goes to his pocket.. Can't blame him entirely.. He, like everyone else, wants to make hay when it shines.. And he is in the wrong side of the age as well..
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Deepak, hmm.. I did a Wiki search and got some idea about the term.. (Software architect).. LOL on your 'color blind' explanation.. Endha 'color' pathi solreenga? ;)
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Anon2, no probs boss.. Just didnt have a clue about what kinda job it was.. avlodhan..
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Vatsan, SPM, being a producer, I am not sure how much of an impact he would have had in the film-making.. Moreover, you have to consider the generation gap as well..

I wouldn't call it as among the worst movies.. An example of short sight.. As if Shankar felt that Rajni would lose his identity and his fans would find difficult to accept him, with a little better story and a tighter script..

PPattian said...

Hi just watched the movie yesterday.. Can agree with most of your views, yet, "when there is Rajini, there is no need of logic" sounds reasonable. I feel it is a great timepass and worth watching more than once.

For the 200 Crore, one of my friend said, "Sivaji, still working as Architect, got stock options of the compnay he is working for and made that money"

The best comedy of the movie would be the fight in which Rajini single handedly beats up an army of adiyaals in that old factory... Not even a single goonda carried any guns in any of the fights. Come on, it is so easy shoot someone than trying to crush his car, or use sword, pole and all kind of primitive weapons.

My general opinion is that Shankar's movies always have numerous loopholes. Check my Anniyan review

http://krishari.blogspot.com/2005/08/trilogy-is-complete.html

Anonymous said...

I agree with u Raju, it's not abt Rajini but abt Shankar's film made to be silly. He should have stressed more on the social issue.

Raju said...

Hari, LOL'ed at ur statement.. Enjoy the celebration..

Ur friend's logic sounds reasonable.. Similar to the millionaire-staffs of Infosys, huh?

My explanation for the fight in Binny factory: The goondas would have looked at Rajini's bodyframe and decided that guns aren't required to attack him. ;)

Enjoyed reading ur review on Anniyan.. Will post my reply for that soon, since I luv that movie..
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Murali, Welcome here..

For me too, it's certainly not about Rajni; it was the responsibility of Shankar to have taken the extra efforts.. I read recently taht Gandhi Krishna of 'Chellame' fame also worked as asst. director.. Wonder what their collective wisdom was used for.. I agree with you that the social issue s'd have been polished quite a bit..

Anonymous said...

Raju : En sivaji logiclam ok va?
VM : " Kitte Thadthe "

Anonymous said...

I agree that the story is totally devoid of any logic, but you have to understand Shankar's constraints as a Tamil movie director directing a Rajinikanth movie.

He has to come up with a movie that caters to everyone across Tamil Nadu. Following a lot of logic would have been suicidal. I thought he did an amazing job by tightening the screenplay and leaving the rest to Rajini's inimitable screen presence.

Raju said...

Vikramadhitya, indha comment parthavudaneye summa adhirndhutten.. :)
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Anon, I agree that it is not an easy task directing a Rajni movie. I was not expecting Shankar to be as expressive as he was in his earlier movies; but he could have done equally, if not better than someone like Suresh Krishna, KS Ravikumar or P Vasu in the script part.

Siva Jayaraman said...

I just saw the movie today... But for Rajini this would have been a flop.. he had to carry the entire movie on his shoulder and Shankar was just not seen... the only Shankar impact in this movie was the grandness of the sets for the song (which definitely doesnt need Shankar)... Rajini simply rocks in the movie...Simple.. Shankar should not direct Rajini.. he cant..

Raju said...

Siva, Welcome here..

I agree with u on all ur points.. but, i am not sure if I would say that he should not direct Rajni.. bcos it is as mega-combo.. Without the vigilante theme and by choosing a strong script which involves story, humor, style, sentiment and action (typical masala), it is possible to make a movie bigger and better than Sivaji.. but I don't think it would ever happen again. It was a once-in-a-lifetime chance for Shankar..

Siva Jayaraman said...

right Raju.. When I said Shankar should not direct Rajini it was more to mean he better does enough homework... enough to the level befitting Thalaivar... which definitely he has not done.. Shankar is arguably(very) the best director in Tamil.. if he has to direct Rajini he better does justice to that which I dont think he has done...

Raju said...

Siva, yeah I agree with you.. He seems to have taken a lot of finer points into a/c but in the major ones (the story and screenplay) he left huge loopholes..