This was the movie that I picked to download to my phone for my long day of travel, and I have no regrets! It was very very very pleasant. And a little interesting. But not super interesting.
Moondram Pillai, so far as I can tell, does not exist with subtitles. So instead I ended up with Sadma with poor subtitles. A challenge for my Hindi skills! Luckily, most of the performance brilliance was in the non-verbal parts.
What a fascinating movie! First, it was released in theaters and online almost simultaneously, which I always find fascinating. And second, it was really really good!
I’m back to K. Balachander! He is just so great. And available on Rajshri Tamil on youtube. And I have also now seen a Gemini Ganesan movie! Which was super distracting, because it was kind of a little bit about his real life and I have no idea if that was on purpose or not. Was his real life situation with multiple wives so well known that it would make sense to bring that into one of his movies?
This was fascinating! Started out a typical police film, and then somewhere it turned into an interesting discussion of crime, regionalism, caste, and all kinds of neat things like that. A lot of it being the same things that Aamir’s big ridiculous Thugs of Hindostan is about to cover, but in modern day instead of colonial times.
I already put up my “no spoilers” review, this is the SPOILERS version. For people who have already seen it, or can’t see it in theaters but want to know what it is like. Or just want to know how it was without spending 2 hours of their lives on the film. Because, although I want to tell you all to buy tickets and support Nivin, I really can’t in good conscience recommend that. It’s not the best use of your time.
Huh. Well, this just barely didn’t work. All the separate parts worked, but they somehow didn’t come together in a way that made for optimal impact. I think I might have to blame the director.
This movie is so good that it tricked me into thinking it was a Balachander. But no, apparently this was the level of camerawork, characters, and acting that was just standard back then!!! Oh, and Kamal Haasan and Rajni Sir are super fun to watch opposite each other in their youth, that’s another plus. The plot is not quite perfect, but it’s still pretty darn good. No Moodru Mudichu, but that’s a very high level to set.
I am finally on schedule again! Ha-Ha!!!! And if I manage to watch and write over the Thanksgiving break (along with re-organizing my kitchen), I might actually get ahead! I could start 2018 with all my decks clear, fully blog-ready! Or I will get super behind and put up a bunch of reposted posts and almost forget Salman’s birthday again. Oh well, it’s his own fault for being born the day after Christmas.
Okay, let’s do this! Tuesday Tamil! Actually on Tuesday! My box office post is still going to be late this week, but at least everything else will be back on track. Plus, I am excited to talk about plot details for this movie. (no spoiler review went up earlier today)
If you are an Austen person, and somehow have not seen this movie yet, FIX THAT!!! It is one of the all time great Austen adaptations, perfectly captures the spirit of the original while moving it to a modern setting. Plus AR Rahman songs.
Well, I saw another new Tamil movie in theaters! Kabali, Vikram-Vedha, and now this. So, 66.6666% of all Tamil films I see in theaters start with “V”. And another 66.66666% involve relatives of Aishwarya Rajnikanth. And 100% of them involve me arriving at the last minute and missing the trailers. Oh well.
Well, I watched Pizza! Which had a high standard to live up to, because the only other horror movie I have seen is The innocents. Oh wait, also Ezra. Which is a lot easier to beat than The Innocents. I think I would say this one landed closer to The Innocents side of the scale than Ezra. Oh! I forgot The Fog! Which hardly qualifies to be called a movie, let alone a horror film. But is fun if you ever want to see Irrfan Khan in the worst film of his career.
Am I correct that this is not the best movie? I am never sure with my Tamil/Telugu/Malayalam films, if I am missing something really subtle that makes it into a brilliant classic. I only picked this one because it had Prithviraj and was available through Netflix. While a good movie and one I enjoyed watching, it didn’t quite have that “BRILLIANT!” feeling. Although the songs were great. And the plot is delightfully complex
dontcallitbollywood 