Monday, January 18, 2016

Tharai Thappattai

My review: Tharai Thappattai


Bala's movies off late have become templated to such an extent even an average joe can predict each and every scene in his movies. Only difference is the setting of the story. It can be a bonded labourers  in a tea estate or physically disabled with a begging mafia, the route the story is going to take and the fate that befalls the protagonists are a given. In "Tharai Thappattai" it is folk artists and the manner in which they endure the torture which in turn is extrapolated on to the viewers. Only this time the movie is superfluous unlike any of his included that forgettable "Avan Ivan". 

The whole conceit of "Tharai Thappattai" is redundant. Nothing happens in a flow. There is contrived situations one after another to such an extent that by the intermission point one can only hear cries of exasperation from the viewers. At point no one knows the whereabouts of the female protagonist and right in the next shot we see the male protagonist just nonchalantly walking into the place where she is housed. Similarly the climax too is straight out a below average masala potboiler of the 80s where the male protagonist can do no wrong except that to remind us that we are watching a Bala movie he can't save the heroine as she is only destined to die.


Except for the hard work put in by all the actors with the exception of the caricatured villain, this movie offers nothing either in terms of entertainment or art. It is sad to see the actors like Sasikumar, G.M.Kumar, Varalakhsmi putting in such a superlative performances which is just going to go down the drains in the end. Ilayaraja's terrific background score also can't redeem this slugfest.
Bala just seems to have concentrated on extracting superb performances from his actors while he himself just floundering in his screenplay and film making. 

On the whole, "Tharai Thappatai" is the weakest of Bala's movies so far.  

Bottomline: crude, crass, tacky, hackneyed, plastic, irritating, torturous,........

2/5

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