Movie: Mankatha (Tamil)
Star Cast: Ajith, Arjun, Trisha, Lakshmi Rai, Andrea, Anjali and Premji Amaren
Director: Venkat Prabhu

Venkat Prabhu is known in the kollywood industry for delivering youthful movies with different storylines and screenplays every time. With Mankatha, he has lived up to his reputation. Apart from the story line, there is innovation in almost every field of the film track like photography and stunts. He has made conscious attempt to deviate from the conventional approach.

Mankatha is a movie about a group of youngsters planning a heist and Ajith executing the plan. It’s a pure mass entertainer with clearly no room for logic and reasoning. The movie opens with a spectacular entry shot for Ajit. Afterall its his 50th movie. He enters in as a police office and intervenes in a gangster fight to save one henchman. After the gravity and physics defying stunts, Ajit is seen partying with the Mankaatha theme song in the background and  Lakshmi rai dancing in the foreground. Trisha is introduced as Ajith’s girlfriend. She is the daughter of a noted kingpin in town. This kingpin is about to transact a huge sum in view of the IPL bettings. Arjun is the head of police anti-corruption team aimed at weeding out the cricket betting scandals. He is married to Andrea. A gang of 4 guys who are close to the kingpin’s circle plan on looting the money from the transaction. But Ajith interferes and takes over the lead. One of the 4 guys, Vaibav who is the right hand of the kingpin is married to Anjali. With Ajith in the helm, the heist goes on successfully. But the actual ride starts after the heist when the plan to get away with the heist. The rest of the movie revolves and zooms around this get away.

Yuvan Shankar Raja’s music is good, but not impressive. Apart from the ‘Vilayadu Mankaatha’ and the ‘Mankaatha theme’ music, the rest of the tracks are passing clouds and nothings lingers on. The songs. music, picturization and choreography don’t seemed to be connected with each other. There is a lack of single theme. They appear to have been conceptualized individually and finally packed into the movie just for commercial gains. ‘Nee naan’ a melodious track, ‘Machi open the bottle’ a mass songs, ‘Balle Lakka’ a fun song and ‘vaada bin laada’ a duet song all masala mixed and packed into the Mankaatha movie. ‘Vaada bin laada’ has an interesting picturization, but overdone graphics makes it looks like an advertising movie.

Ajith has risen to a status that his mere screen presence can pull along an entire movie. It’s rare to see a leading actor in grey hairs and he has carried it well. At certain instances he freezes with his stony expressions, but those shots have been compensated by angle of camera brilliantly. The entire movie is 100% Ajith movie and is made for Ajith fans specifically. He rules and dominates the movie frame by frame. Excellent background score, stylish shots, brilliant costume designing and simple locations add to the luster of this movie. Arjun has done a great job, fitting well with the movie and the character. True to his image of an action hero, his fight sequences are explosive. The 4 guys  Vaibhav Reddy, Ganesh, Mahat and Premji Amaran have done an exceptional job. Premji Amaran is starting to irritate with his stereotypical expressions and clichéd one-liners. Trisha is forgotten in the movie totally, but she is a pretty eye candy to have around. Lakshmi rai, Anjali and Andrea have few minutes of screen time and one song each. Again they are just eye candies in the storyline.

Though the movie has a lot of violent sequences, it has been handled neatly. Eliminating all emotional and sentimental drags, even death has been handled poshly. It’s a movie where you come out of the theater with smiling face. You are entertained beyond expectation and is worth every moment and dime spent.

Advertisement