Devil's Double Next Level

If anyone who follows movies says that horror comedies are a thing of the past, show them the Tamil film slate. Almost every two weeks, a horror comedy takes over the screens. Whether it lives up to the horror or comedy genre is debatable. This week, we have Santhanam’s ‘DD Next Level’, the fourth film in the ‘Dhilluku Dhuddu’ franchise. Is it a great addition to the franchise? Let’s find out! DD Next Level’s premise is fascinating, especially because it includes a film critic. Krishna aka Kissa 47 (Santhanam) is a film critic on YouTube, who uses rap to share his views. He gets called to a special screening along with his family. When he reaches the venue, he feels that something is off and returns. Upon returning, he finds out that his family, including his mother, father and sister, are already seated inside a theatre.

DD film series has a tested template. It starts with a prologue about a haunted place and moves to a first half that deals with the romance of the lead pair and their arrival at the place of horror and finally, the third act of horror-comedy cocktail. DD Next Level, the costliest of the series, is a bit more interesting despite following the template to a large extent. Adding a meta layer to the template has made a huge difference to the worn-out horror-comedy genre. However, the novelty runs out of steam pretty soon as the filmmakers run out of ideas in the second half, resorting to the usual antics of the genre.

There’s a list of clever ideas in Santhanam’s meta comedy Devil’s Double Next Level that should have resulted in a film that’s at least remotely funny. It’s a spoof movie that operates on the same founding principle of the Scary Movie franchise and you find the film breaking the fourth wall throughout its runtime to keep throwing references and cliches towards you, hoping at least a few would stick. Some of these, like the idea of casting Gautham Vasudev Menon to play a police officer named Raghavan, might not seem like a big deal. But then the film goes several steps further to make this character fall in love with the protagonist’s sister and then run after her on the beach while ‘Uyirin Uyire’ from Kaakha Kaakha (2003) plays in the background. It’s definitely immature and silly, but at least there’s a bit of thought that has gone into making the joke land.