Guild Reviews
L2: Empuraan
Action, Crime, Thriller (Malayalam)
The journey of Stephen Nedumpally, a man leading a double life as Khureshi Ab'raam, an enigmatic leader of a powerful global crime syndicate.
Cast:
Mohanlal, Prithviraj Sukumaran, Abhimanyu Singh, Manju Warrier, Tovino Thomas
Director:
Prithviraj Sukumaran
Writer:
Murali Gopy
Mohanlal, Prithviraj Bring The Fury in Empuraan
Wed, April 2 2025
Displays Bravery in its Politics, but is Ultimately a Tedious Commercial Star Vehicle
Mon, March 31 2025
A few days before the release of L2: Empuraan, actor/director Prithviraj Sukumaran was asked in a press conference about how Malayalam films banked on content for their acclaim/success, and if his film would follow suit. Given that the film was a sequel to the 2019 hit Lucifer, Mohanlal’s bid for a globe-trotting, convoluted spy thriller fused with a homegrown tale of political succession, the condescending tone of the question addressing the sequel wasn’t entirely unreasonable. And thus, Sukumaran stepped in to say it was still ‘content’ that had dictated the making of L2; only the content was expensive to shoot. When I saw this clip two days before the film’s release, I fobbed it aside as another one of those empty promises made during a marketing campaign. But only two days later, I found out that the film was being targetted by right-wing forces. This is going to be a challenging review to write because L2: Empuraan is barely a competent film. Inheriting the vague world-building of the first film, Sukumaran’s film is everywhere and nowhere. One of the two primary plotlines takes place in Kerala around its local politics, while the other takes place between Senegal, London, Iraq and Berlin.
Local Goes Global
Sat, March 29 2025
Empuraan, the sequel to the 2019 Malayalam film Lucifer, is a high-budget, globe-trotting actioner reminiscent of productions from YRF or the Tamil and Telugu film industry. The success of its predecessor has elevated the scale and ambition of this installment. However, with such ambition often comes the risk of overlooking essential elements in favor of a grander vision. In this instance, the screenplay suffers due to an emphasis on extravagant action, where style frequently overshadows substance. At nearly three hours in length, the film initially packs in a great deal of content but later tends to meander. Prithviraj, who has transitioned from actor to director, possesses the vision necessary for a project of this magnitude, yet the foundational material must be robust. The film clearly aims to appeal to mass audiences, featuring slow-motion sequences and other stylistic choices. While there is nothing inherently wrong with this approach, it occasionally aspires to get serious,, and the fusion of these elements does not always produce the desired effect. It is helpful to recall key details from Lucifer, which was released five years ago. The narrative reintroduces international crime syndicates and the underworld, with Khureshi (Mohanlal) returning to the fray. Regrettably, the local character Stephen Nedumpally, also portrayed by Mohanlal and central to the action in Lucifer, takes a back seat in this sequel.
Santosh
Crime, Drama, Thriller (Hindi)
A government scheme sees newly widowed Santosh inherit her husband’s job as a police constable in the rural badlands of Northern India. When a low-caste girl is found raped and murdered, she is pulled into the investigation under the wing of charismatic feminist inspector Sharma.
Cast:
Shahana Goswami, Sunita Rajwar, Naval Shukla, Sanjay Bishnoi, Shashi Beniwal
Director:
Sandhya Suri
In a world where her whole life she has had nothing to her name, she chose to take whatever power they gave her.
Wed, April 2 2025
Shahana Goswami Anchors a Clear-eyed, Moving Indictment of New India
Mon, March 24 2025
Santosh is two movies. The first is rooted in how Santosh, meaning “contentment” or “happiness”, is traditionally a man’s name. This underdog movie is about Santosh Saini (Shahana Goswami), a 28-year-old widow who inherits her late husband’s police job. As a new woman constable, Santosh strives to make a name in the notoriously masculine field of law enforcement. She finds a mentor in Geeta Sharma (Sunita Rajwar), a veteran cop who has over the years become a symbol of feminism and gender empowerment. Together, they investigate the brutal rape and murder of a 15-year-old girl. Santosh impresses her superiors, transcends her “compassionate appointment” (or bereavement quota) image, reclaims her own identity, and chases the case. This is the film that a specific India believes in: an inspiring coming-of-age story, a narrative of human fortitude, a gritty tale of patriarchy smashing and female agency. Santosh herself believes in it. It’s her against the world. But this is also the film that’s sold to this India. One that’s bereft of complexity, truth, ambiguity and labels. Ignorance, as they say, is bliss — or contentment.
Shahana Goswami shines in Sandhya Suri’s bleak crime drama that serves as a rebuttal to Rohit Shetty’s Cop Universe
Mon, November 18 2024
A few years ago, there was an uproar over a scene of sustained violence in director Kathryn Bigelow’s Detroit, a period crime drama about a real-life incident that led to the deaths of three young men. The controversial scene unfolded across several uncomfortable minutes, and showed a group of white police officers beat down a lineup of innocent Black men. Bigelow didn’t avert her eyes from the horror, and instead, caught the audience by the scruff of the neck and made them watch. The film’s examination of ingrained racism, police brutality, and the systemic oppression of minorities drew parallels to modern-day America, but it also divided audiences. Director Sandhya Suri’s Santosh, which was screened at the recent Dharamshala International Film Festival, unpacks similar themes, but in the context of contemporary north India. Like Detroit, it pivots on a scene of unrelenting brutality that transforms it from a standard police procedural into something more haunting.
Delulu Express
Comedy (Hindi)
Zakir Khan is back with his hysterical new special! Go on a wild ride with stories about friendship and love, first jobs and quitting them, eventful train journeys, and the amusing retelling of the longest day of his life.
Cast:
Zakir Khan
Director:
Karan Asnani
Writer:
Zakir Khan
We're All Aboard Zakir Khan's Train of Thought
Tue, April 1 2025
Watching Zakir Khan do stand-up comedy is to reckon with the limitations of the art form and the possibilities of it. It is to witness regular observations carry the weight of a punchline and existential thoughts take flight with the lightness of humour. It is to see a man holding the audience in thrall even with his silence. Tathastu in 2022 was a genre-defying set that wrapped thoughts about his parents, concerns about mortality, and filial resentment in humour without punctuating them with gags. His latest Delulu Express does something similar without reiterating the format or style. It is a lighter arrangement imbued with excessive style and multiple characters. On paper it is more chaotic but beats with the same narrative heart that Khan has been honing since Tathastu.
Zakir Khan is Funny — and Necessary
Fri, March 28 2025
Watching a Zakir Khan stand-up special is like watching that funny friend from your childhood actually find his true calling. It’s sort of moving, because you know for a fact that none of those friends took their talent seriously. Society simply reduces them to a personality type — the witty guy, the joker, the attention seeker, the mischief monger, the crowd pleaser, the yapper. If anything, they barely recognise it as a talent. Khan’s sets often feel like an authentication of such transient, everyday humour. His languid delivery expands the most ordinary details into mini-narratives of being alive. Which is to say: Zakir Khan isn’t a comedian; he’s a very good storyteller with comic timing. He isn’t really funny; he’s funnily real.
Sikandar
Action, Thriller (Hindi)
A fiery youth confronts a powerful network of corruption, challenging the status quo and fighting for the common people's rights in a nation gripped by injustice.
Cast:
Salman Khan, Rashmika Mandanna, Sathyaraj, Sharman Joshi, Kajal Agarwal
Director:
A.R. Murugadoss
'Sikandar' is a drab, sluggish 'being human' campaign for Salman Khan
Tue, April 1 2025
There’s something pitiable, even desperate, about Sikandar’s attempts to glorify its titular hero. He is Sanjay (Salman Khan), a beloved raja, whose people worship him because of his philanthropic (read ‘being human’) ways. Writer-director A.R. Murugadoss sticks to a bland, predictable template for the narrative. An action sequence, followed by a romantic sequence with wife (Rashmika Mandanna); throw in a song, stir up some random conflict that necessitates an action sequence again where Sikandar, the eternal saviour, rises. The rallying call? “Raja sahab, mujhe bachalo!”. If there’s one flaw in the infallible hero, it’s that he’s got little time for his Mrs. It’s another thing that scenes featuring the Mr and Mrs are entirely devoid of romance or chemistry, making it perhaps one of the most sterile jodis of cinema. Preference for praja over wife comes at a heavy price for the protagonist. Where Murugadoss hopes to make Sikandar stand out in the Bhai genre of films is by showcasing him as a grieving husband and also a Gujarati with a ginormous heart. It’s a load that the stone-faced star struggles with.
Old Wine, Old Bottle
Tue, April 1 2025
Following the releases of Bajrangi Bhaijaan and Sultan in 2015 and 2016, respectively, Salman Khan’s career has faced a downward trajectory marked by a series of unsuccessful films. His popularity has waned, and the arrival of Sikander has been met with little excitement, suggesting it may also depart the same way. Despite the involvement of A.R. Murgadoss, you would expect some kind of anticipation to build up but maybe the filmmakers knew it was a lost cause.. The only positive aspect is that Sikander is not as bad as Kisi Ka Bhai Kisi Ki Jaan (2023) Radhe (2021) or Tubelight (2017), but then that is not saying much. The standards have fallen so low in recent years that they have reached rock bottom.
Salman Khan's disinterest has peaked, and in a directly proportional manner, so has our disillusionment.
Mon, March 31 2025
‘Welcome to hell,’ says Salman Khan somewhere at the beginning of Sikandar. It doesn’t take you long to realise he was warning you about his own film. Salman, set to turn 60 this December, was never much of an actor (I use ‘much’ with much politeness). Except, perhaps, for few and far between flashes of some sort of emoting — and emotion — in films like Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam and Tere Naam, and a fistful of others. The last film he truly ‘acted’ in was Kabir Khan’s Bajrangi Bhaijaan, and that was 10 years ago. In the last couple of outings (see box), the indifference has been evident, with directors employing everything from miraculous computer graphics to superhuman editing skills to simply ensure that Salman is a living presence on screen. In Sikandar, Salman’s disinterest has peaked, and in a directly proportional manner, so has our disillusionment.
Ponman
Drama (Malayalam)
In a coastal village, gold dealer Ajesh lends 25 sovereigns to Bruno for his sister Steffy's wedding. Chaos ensues when Steffy marries criminal Mariano, who hoards the gold and tries to eliminate Ajesh. Can Ajesh outsmart Mariyano?
Cast:
Basil Joseph, Lijomol Jose, Sajin Gopu, Anand Manmadhan, Deepak Parambol
Director:
Jyothish Shankar
Writer:
G.R. Indugopan
A Stunning Basil Joseph Shines In This Stressful, High-Stakes Drama
Sun, March 30 2025
Ponman seems like a silly title for the film this turned out to be. The title translates to ‘kingfisher’, but it’s also a play on the phrase ‘pon’ meaning gold and man, because it’s about a man who deals in gold. By the end of the film, though, one might find other reasons to justify this title, but to begin with, you understand that it’s referring to the character played by Basil Joseph, a strange character named PP Ajesh. Going by the term the film uses, he runs what is called a “Madiyil Jewellery”, the kind of mobile jewellery in which the gold, literally, ends up on your lap. I’m not sure if this business is specific to Kollam, where the film is set in, but from my understanding of the trade, Ajesh is a broker who supplies gold to brides right before they get married, expecting to be repaid using the money they earn in the form of gifts during the wedding. It’s a peculiar practice, something many of us will discover as we watch Ponman. It is also ideal as a plot device in a film that talks about dowry, that too within the fascinating Latin Catholic community of the region. So, when we first meet PP Ajesh, he’s supplying 25 sovereigns of gold to a bride named Stefi Graf (Lijimol Jose), a night before she gets married to the “big, mountain-like” Mariyano (Sajin Gopu).
Ponman avoids sermons, instead crafting a high-stakes drama where “heroes and villains blur.”
Sat, March 29 2025
Basil Joseph Shines In A Well-Written Film Of Grit And Resilience
Sat, February 1 2025
If one has to go on a quest to find why the Malayalam film industry is consistent with churning out good cinema, the journey will end with the secret alchemy of finding stories from the people. Lijo Joseph’s Angamaly Diaries is about Angamaly. Maheshinte Prathikaram provides a gorgeous landscape of Idukki, and so does Idukki Gold. Manjummel Boys is, well, about the resilience of the boys from Manjummel. Malayalam writers don’t make stories but end up finding them around. Ponman, written by GR Indugopan and Justin Mathew, is yet another story about everyday people in the port city of Kollam. The story, the conflict, and the stake of Ponman are small. But the film leaves one pondering about big things of human resilience, grit, and ethics–typical of good Malayalam cinema. The film’s protagonist PP Ajeesh (Basil Joseph), has a rather unique and risky business called Madiyil Jewelry or Walking Gold. Ajeesh sells gold upfront to families who are struggling to come up with dowry themselves to marry off their daughters. After the wedding, the families pay him off with the gift money. The conflict in Ponman arises when Ajeesh lends 25 sovereign gold to the family of Steffi (Lijo Mol Josse), but her useless brother Bruno (Anandh Manmadhan) and hapless mother only make half the amount to pay back. With Steffi’s husband being a short-fused ruffian from a notorious area of Kollam, Ajeesh ends up in a do-or-die predicament to retrieve his gold.
Seruppugal Jaakirathai
Comedy, Mystery (Tamil)
A pair of ordinary slippers becomes the center of chaos when a diamond smuggler uses them as a hiding spot, triggering a frantic search across town.
Cast:
Singampuli, Vivek Rajagopal, Ira Agarwal
Director:
Rajesh Soosairaj
Chaotic Funeral Comedy
Sun, March 30 2025
Rathinam, a desperate smuggler, conceals a diamond in his slipper during a police raid, inadvertently swapping it with Thyagarajan’s. Thyagarajan, a mild-mannered auditor, and his son, Ilango, discover the swap after the funeral but promptly lose the slipper in a series of comical mishaps. The slipper passes through various eccentric characters, each adding their own chaotic element to the search. Singam Puli, the only familiar face in the show packed with newcomers, does what’s expected of him with his trademark dialogue delivery. There’s nothing new that he does with it, though; he easily sleepwalks through it. Vivek Rajgopal needs more time to develop a flair for comedy; he’s sillier than funny here. While Ira Aggarwal looks good, the role provides her hardly anything substantial.
Kill Dill
(English)
Kisha's search for her missing sister leads her to The Heartbreak Club, a shadowy campus organization. With help from charming captain Tavish, she delves deeper into a web of dangerous secrets.
Timepass Campus Thriller
Sun, March 30 2025
Kisha joins Fair High to find her missing sister, Anara, discovering her connection to the secretive Heartbreak Club (THC). She navigates dangerous games and broken hearts, including her own growing feelings for Tavish. Over time, Kisha deals with THC’s chess-like hierarchy, facing threats and betrayals. She eventually unearths the identities of the King and the Queen, who hold the access to THC’s database. Where will Kisha’s quest to find Anara culminate? Anushka Sen is an apt fit to be the face of the show in terms of her age, appearance and portrayal, delivering a neat performance as a girl who goes all out to find her sister and loses her way. Prit Kamani continues to prove that he’s a talent worth watching out for, playing a college heartthrob and an insecure lover with restraint. In her brief screen time, Priyamvada Kant is equally convincing.
The Life List
Romance, Comedy, Drama (English)
When her mother sends her on a quest to complete a teenage bucket list, a young woman uncovers family secrets, finds romance — and rediscovers herself.
Cast:
Sofia Carson, Kyle Allen, Sebastian de Souza, Connie Britton, José Zúñiga
Director:
Adam Brooks
Writer:
Adam Brooks
Sofia Carson's Spiritless Family Drama Fails To Elicit Proper Emotions
Sun, March 30 2025
Netflix’s The Life List is designed as a tearjerker but doesn’t really push any exceptional buttons while trying to reach viewers’ emotions. Sofia Carson plays Alex, a young woman either in her late 20s or early 30s who gets her kick in life from her dead mother. Alex supposedly becomes a grownup in the course of the feature; however, it feels as if the film is pushing too hard to make us feel without actually showing us why. The film opens with Alex at a crossroads in life without the job of her dreams, directionless and not serious about her future. After the death of her mother, Elizabeth (Connie Britton), Alex is shocked by the directives in her will. In a move that will remind Bollywood fans of Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, her mother sends Alex her teenage bucket list to complete. Upon completion of each one, she receives a video message and moves one step closer towards her inheritance. Reluctantly, Alex agrees but not before arguing with everyone about it, including the handsome young lawyer Brad (Kyle Allen) assigned to handle her mother’s estate.
MobLand
Crime, Drama (English)
Power is up for grabs as the Harrigans and Stevensons, two warring London crime families, clash in a kill-or-be-killed battle that threatens to topple empires and ruin lives. Caught in the crossfire is Harry Da Souza, the street-smart 'fixer' as dangerous as he is handsome, who knows too well where loyalties lie when opposing forces collide. As kingdom goes up against kingdom, lines will be crossed - and the only saving grace is a bet-your-life guarantee: family above everything.
Cast:
Tom Hardy, Pierce Brosnan, Helen Mirren, Paddy Considine, Joanne Froggatt
Tom Hardy Is A Reserved Fixer In Guy Ritchie's Surprisingly Muted Crime Drama
Sun, March 30 2025
The new crime drama, MobLand, directed by Guy Ritchie, holds all the hallmarks of the filmmaker. And yet there is something distinctive missing from the gritty gangster saga as Tom Hardy plays Harry Da Souza, a fixer left to clean up the many messes of the Harrigan family. So far, the nine-episode London-set series is keeping a cliffhanger for each chapter in trying to raise the tension. Ronan Bennett’s series has had a slow-moving start, but it needs to amp things up to match the intensity of Ritchie’s other projects. Hardy’s Harry has been loyally serving Conrad Harrigan (Pierce Brosnan) for a long time now. The fixer saves the old crime lord and every member of his family whenever they get in a bind. But we join the story at a bit of a power struggle between the Harrigans and their rivals, the Stevensons, before erupting into an all out war. As Harry tries to smoothen things over, his family life suffers as well. Who will be left standing at the end when the lines are all drawn out against family loyalties?
Robinhood
Action (Telugu)
A modern Robin Hood switches from stealing to protecting when circumstances make him the reluctant bodyguard of a high-profile client.
Cast:
Nithiin, Sreeleela, Vennela Kishore, Rajendra Prasad, Ketika Sharma
Director:
Venky Kudumula
Writer:
Venky Kudumula
Nithiin, Sreeleela headline a tepid comedy that needed more highs and laughs
Sat, March 29 2025
Robinhood movie review: Director Venky Kudumula loves making films that have a simple premise, a convincing lead, enjoyable songs, and a convoluted narrative seamlessly tied together with a lot of laughs. In his latest, Robinhood, all of these are in place, but with the laughs not enough, and the ambitious narrative not being supported by the writing, Venky’s dreamy house of cards crashes down. Remember Ravi Teja-Surender Reddy’s Kick? The film that was about a do-gooder thief who tries his best to outwit the system and a tough-as-nails cop, and serve the needy by robbing from the rich. The same film was remade in Tamil with Ravi Mohan, Kannada with Upendra, and Hindi with Salman Khan. Did you ever think what would happen if Nithiin starred in the rehash of the 2009 film? No, right? Neither did many others, but Venky had other plans, and he mixes elements of yet another Telugu film that Salman Khan remade in 2011 — Ready.
Nithiin, Sreeleela’s action-comedy is a misfire
Fri, March 28 2025
It is one thing to not take yourself too seriously when you are making a comedy and another when the irreverence serves as a mask to camouflage a lazily-written and a casually-executed film. To make up for a shallow plot and the limitations of its leads, the film is desperate to elicit laughs. Apart from Nithiin and Sreeleela, the presence of multiple comedians, actors from at least half a dozen film industries, an in-form composer and a cameo by Australian cricketer David Warner try to salvage a mess. The Telugu film Robinhood, much like its title, leaves little to your imagination. An orphaned protagonist, Ram (Nithiin), takes inspiration from a school pledge to claim that the entire country is his family. In his childhood, he uses this excuse to rob the rich and helps run orphanages that are starved of funds (which is reminiscent of the Ravi Teja-starrer Kick). It is amusing that it takes the cops over a decade to focus on this case and nab the culprit.
Holland
Thriller, Mystery, Romance (English)
Nancy is a teacher whose life with her husband in Holland, Michigan, tumbles into a twisted tale when she and her colleague become suspicious of a secret.
Cast:
Nicole Kidman, Gael García Bernal, Matthew Macfadyen, Jude Hill, Jeff Pope
Director:
Mimi Cave
Writer:
Andrew Sodroski
Nicole Kidman's Thriller Tries Too Hard, Falls Short Despite Good Performances
Sat, March 29 2025
The mystery thriller is directed by Mimi Cave, who is best known for Flesh, a film focused on body horror. A glimpse of the same can be seen in Holland, but this is more focused on being a mystery thriller for its own characters. The trailer zeros in on the story, and the same narrative is explored during the almost two-hour-long film. Led by Nicole Kidman and Matthew Macfadyen, the film explores the dynamics of a family that looks perfect on the outside but something sinister is going on underneath. The film also stars a young actor Jude Hill and Gael García Bernal as the second love interest for Nicole. It begins with Nicole’s narration as Nancy Vandergroot, a teacher at the local high school where he kid also goes. She is respected around the town as the wife of Fred Vandergroot, a good church going man who is a life-saving doctor. Their kid, Harry, follows every word of his father, who ends up mediating their fights. Their life is perfect and good, but something remains off about Nancy as she gets obsessive and paranoid about little things. First, it is a missing earning which leads to her firing a babysitter and later, it is a receipt she finds in Fred’s pants.
Horrid but not horrific, new Nicole Kidman film has little to say about anything
Fri, March 28 2025
After breaking out with the horror-thriller Fresh a few years ago — this was the movie in which Daisy Edgar-Jones played a young woman on a blind date with a man who turns out to be a cannibal — director Mimi Cave stays firmly in her comfort zone with her sophomore project, this week’s Holland. The cast is bigger, as is the budget and the scale. Fresh was mostly restricted to one large house, where the predatory male protagonist would lure his female prey and then, literally feast on them. An entire suburban town serves as Cave’s playground this time around; and at least one of its citizens is a killer of women. Nicole Kidman plays Nancy, a seemingly mild-mannered woman who works at the local school and dotes on her husband, Fred, played by Matthew Macfadyen. The one-time heartthrob — he played Mr Darcy in 2005’s Pride & Prejudice adaptation — seems to have been typecast as weaselly villains following his memorable performance as Tom Wambsgans in HBO’s Succession. Fred works as an optometrist; he’s the sort of guy that everybody seems to be friendly with, but crucially, not friends with. Nancy becomes suspicious when he starts going on weekly work trips, often using the flimsiest excuses.
Veera Dheera Sooran 2
Action, Crime, Drama, Thriller (Tamil)
Kaali is a provision store owner and a loving husband and father, whose involvement in a dangerous crime network and his mysterious mission forms the rest of the story.
Cast:
Vikram, S. J. Suryah, Suraj Venjaramoodu, Dushara Vijayan, Prudhviraj
Director:
S. U. Arunkumar
Writer:
S. U. Arunkumar
(Writing for OTT Play)
The Return Of The Vikram Everyone Loves
Fri, March 28 2025
For those who, in the flush of their youth in the early 2000s, in Tamil Nadu, life was coloured by many movies starring Vikram, but most notably Dhill (2001), Gemini (2002), Dhool (2003) and Saamy (2003). He had many hits post those too, but they all demanded so much of him physically — he gained weight, he lost weight, prosthetics were called in — we rarely got to see the performer in him shine without a crutch. We hardly got to see his shy smile or just be part of the universe created by a director, without drawing any attention to himself. Thaandavam (2012) and Mahaan (2022) were rare exceptions. The audience had to wait till 2025 to see vintage Vikram or the people’s much-loved Chiyaan back on the big screen. As Kaali in SU Arun Kumar’s Veera Dheera Sooran: Part 2, Vikram makes time stand still, and you can also see the film as a continuation of the works he greenlit in the 2000s. There’s action - yes, there’s love - yes, there’s sentiment - yes, but there’s also that lovely thing missing in most films — a hero who is part of the ambience, a hero who prefers lurking in the shadows, a hero who shies away from the spotlight. Cinematographer Theni Eswar lights and frames these dark spaces beautifully, considering most of the film takes place at night.
A terrific Vikram anchors a gritty actioner that walks the tightrope between realistic and masala elements
Fri, March 28 2025
In many ways, Veera Dheera Sooran is director SU Arun Kumar’s version of Lokesh Kanagaraj’s Kaithi. The entire film unfolds during a single night, and builds towards an important event that must take place at sunrise. There is a gang on the run, and hunting them is a police officer with a plan. There is a sense of urgency. There are chases, fights, and violence. And then… there’s a weapon of mass destruction waiting to be unleashed. And yet, Veera Dheera Sooran is as distinct a film as Kaithi. How beautiful is it that similar stories can look and feel so different because of a filmmaker’s style and vision, and of course… the actor’s stardom?
Vikram And SU Arun Kumar's Film Is all Brawn, Brains And Heart Too
Fri, March 28 2025
‘Enter late and exit early’ is a popular screenwriting mantra that demands a writer start off the scene a bit late, narrowing it down to the important processing of the narrative, and exit before the resolution, leaving the audience wanting more. Director SU Arun Kumar has applied a part of this technique to the whole of Veera Dheera Sooran, which seems like a midpiece of a narrative. Hence, it’s numbered ‘Part 2’, despite being the first segment to get released. When we enter the world of Veera Dheera Sooran, it feels like you opened a novel midway. The characters are already established, and so are the origin of the context, and the motive of the characters. The film doesn’t wait for you to catch up, because it attempts to create a reality, where you are just an observer. It is indifferent to your understanding of what’s going on, and that’s the brilliance of Veera Dheera Sooran. It is more like reading a book than watching a film because it demands your investment. Things kick off when a husband complains to the police that Kannan (Suraj Venjarmoodu), an influential gangster, has done something to his missing wife and daughter. SP Arunagiri (SJ Suryah), who harbours vengeance for Kannan and his father Ravi aka Periyavar (Prudhvi Raj), uses the opportunity to end the two. When things get bad to worse, Periyavar seeks the help of an old friend, Kaali (Vikram), who is now running a provision store in a village. We are never explicitly told about all of their dynamics, but we seem to get it. That’s the splendour of the writing. You understand the characters by their actions, and not by what they say. Kaali is tasked with the job of killing the SP, but things take a different route when a hit job goes haywire.