VIVEGAM (Prudence): Movie Review (Desi Rating: 2.5/5 Stars)

By: Suhinth Mohan
Desi Rating: 2.5/5 Stars

Finally, the much hyped and anticipated Ajith Kumar starrer Vivegam released all over the world on 24th of August 2017. Of course, Tamil movie goers have been waiting for it for a while as this movie is termed as the comeback of the super star Ajith after a break of two years, his last release was VEDHALAM. Vivegam star cast also include Kajal Agarwal, Viveak Oberoi, Akshara Hassan and Karunagaran.  I had very high expectation from this Siva directorial, because of Ajith Kumar and the songs/trailers that have already created a buzz and I am sure most of the Tamil film enthusiasts had it too.  I must say I wasn’t very satisfied, for me this time movie didn’t live up to the hype it created. This happens most of the time when you raise audience expectations way to high, that even a good movie can’t satisfy them as audience is now looking for a great movie.

Story line is larger than life with saving the world plot along with usual twists and a love story, all what you expect form a commercial entertainer. There is an atomic bomb buried under India which when activated can cause a massive earth quake and only one girl can deactivate it which our hero is assigned to find. First half of the movie creates questions and Second half of the film is designed to answer them.

Story line is unnecessarily complicated and doesn’t explain most of the things, Audience has to guess most of the time as to what is happening which never let audience fully connect to the plot line.

Now first let me highlight all the good that this one has to offer. Ajith Kumar’s performance is very enjoyable. The movie starts with him taking down Serbian Mafia alone. His hard work and dedication to the movie can be seen throughout his performance. Especially his physical transformation deserves a special mention. He comes out as this larger than life action hero, who when required can fly like superman. Supporting cast is also good in their individual capacity. Kajal Agarwal does her role well and her character is very different from her previous work, which is refreshing. The debutant Akshara Hassan has amazing screen presence and will manage to stay in the audience’s heart even with her very limited screen time. She seems to have all the talent to continue her father’s (Kamal Hassan’s) legacy. Vivegam is different from the previous Ajith-Siva productions. Movie is shot entirely in Europe and the cinematographer Vetri captures it beautifully. Anirudh who is a Rockstar in his own style creates a trend setting musical experience. Action scenes such as bike chasing in Serbia and underground tunnel fights are top notch. VFX of the movie are also reasonable and give a very video game sort of vibe. There are so many individual good moments and elements to look for and that’s where the negatives come in too.

These individual elements don’t go along well as one narrative and lose their charm with Imperfect storytelling/confusing hero centric screenplay of Siva. Siva has focused way too much on showing Ajith as a hero that he completely sidelined the other elements. In fact, Ajith’s stardom display has cannibalized the film. Antagonist played by Vivek Oberoi never gets the required focus and never fully develops as a villain. As an audience, we need to really hate the villain as much as we like the hero to enjoy their rivalry to the max. So, a perfect balance between hero and villain is a must in a commercial entertainer which is clearly missing here. This could have been a much better film, if only makers had focused more on the film’s logical aspects and not rely entirely on Ajith’s star power.

Overall this movie is enjoyable in parts and if you are big Ajith’s fan will give you enough of him. But for me, this movie didn’t work that much as a commercial action-thriller entertainer, I go with 2.5 stars.