Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Thoughts on VTV

When i came out of the hall after watching VTV there was more a sense of relief that it was over which is a pity given it was engaging for long stretches. It was beginning to wear thin towards the end and was playing with my patience. The problem with love stories is that no matter how much you play around with the script, you can have only two possibilities. The guy gets the girl or he doesn't. So the narrative style is the key. Gautam has a gift for romantic yarns. He does seem to derive a lot from personal experience. Vazhkaila romba adi pattutaaru pola irukku. Lines like 'one way ticket to heartbreak city' can't be made up by a 'kal nenjam' who hasn't ever fallen in love.

Simbu as Karthik gives a very sincere performance. That should have been easy for him since he starts loving his heroines anyway so he just needed to be himself. Trisha as Jessie looks great. Her costumes are beautiful and simple. She is dressed in saris for the most part and looks elegant and sexy. She hasn't looked this good ever since the days of mounam pesiyadhey and saami.

The first half of the movie is breezy and entertaining. I liked the cinematographer guy who hangs around with Simbu. He was fun with his deadpan dialogue delivery. But the strength and weakness of the movie is the second half. Generally in movies, characters always seem to be cocksure of what they are doing. They know exactly when they fall in love (of course cue music always helps) and they know that they are made for each other etc. Real life hardly is that straightforward. A zillion thoughts are racing through the mind. The mind is always playing tricks. Which is not the case here. However Gautam has made his jessie character very real, so real that after some time you just want to say - please cut the crap and let us all rest in peace. One can understand the pain the character goes through but not feel it and hence it starts to get annoying. It is like having a 'sarakku' session with your friends and one of them starts to tell his own sad story. You want to empathise with him and be comforting but in the end it ain't your story. All you can do is nod your head and come up with some pearls of wisdom.

I have often wondered why do even very good movies have so much drama? Why can't they be a bit more subtle? Even a beautiful movie like Mouna ragam had this dramatic finish towards the end when a dazed Mohan jumps and slips like Kamal in Moondram Pirai and hops on to the train to be reunited with Revathi. But it seems that the emotional high that one gets with such moments in movies is what makes them tick and VTV could have had some more of those. For example there is this cheesy scene where Simbu knocks out Jessie's brother and his goons. For a very short while i was emotionally attached to the scene. Felt like bashing them up myself. It was a shallow scene and quite unnecessary. But i felt the connect. For large portions of the second half, the frustrating behaviour of Jessie is very real and possible to empathize with. But i just didn't care. Maybe VTV could have done with some more drama.

The climax is simple and feels right. That had to be the only way the movie had to end after rambling directionless just like this post.



4 comments:

rv said...

As always, I don't write blogs. But I am prolific in writing comments on your blog and ofcourse rediff.com.

First of all congrats on reviewing, i guess your first review on "yet another movie". I guess it is like clearing your throat to speak. Now you must be done with how life doesn't imitate movies part. Especially how a South indian's life doesn't imitate South Indian movie but is rather the opposite. Non-conformism is in vogue you see...
I lost my line of thought already.. as always happens with the comments man...

Bibin said...

Dear Siva,

ivlo perusa katha ezhuthi irukkeengaley... kadasila enna thaan solla vareenga, about vtv?

siva said...

@rv : Thanks mate for the comments. But koncham philosophy too much da. And u leave comments on rediff? kidding right?

@Bibin: Oru PhD pannittu ivaluva kooda ezhuthalana eppadi. Anyway in summary, VTV is a good movie albeit just a bit slow and frustrating towards the end.

Subashini Tirumalai said...

Sarakku example semma!!