Pillaiyar Theru Kadaisi Veedu

Thirumalai Kishore’s directorial debut has a clichéd storyline and loosely-scripted characters.
The poster of 'Pillaiyar Theru Kadaisi Veedu'.
The poster of 'Pillaiyar Theru Kadaisi Veedu'.

‘Pillaiyar Theru Kadaisi Veedu’ (Tamil)

Director: Thirumalai Kishore

Cast: Jithan Ramesh, Sanchita Padukone, Suhasini, Jayaprakash, Ilavarasu, Bose Venkat and Akila

After a fairly long sabbatical of four years, Jithan Ramesh returns to screen with ‘Pillaiyar Theru Kadaisi Veedu’, produced under his home production (SuperGood films). The film scripted and directed by debutant Thirumalai Kishore revolves around Ganesh a cheerful young man from an affluent family, who leads a carefree life, whiling away time with his friends until he meets a girl and falls in love.

There’s only conclusion anyone can draw from the film — the director seems to be stuck in a time warp. Whether it’s his plot and situations or in the style of presentation, there is a stale feel. PTKV appears to be a rehashed version of one of the old films of the banner (‘Suryavamsam’). There’s nothing wrong with rehashing old subjects, but the director could have at least given it a contemporary touch.

Few unexplained situations, and scenes lack conviction. He has used different locations and showed them as the neighbourhoods of the hero’s suburban home. But they don’t jell together.

Jithan Ramesh plays Ganesh who spends most of his time with friends, the kind of shabby sidekicks you see in all films and wonder what bonds them together. Ganesh, an ardent fan of actor T Rajendar, does a take-off on TR.

Also, a hoarding is shown in the film where he is depicted standing next to TR in a similar costume and posing for a photograph. But all these scenes seem more like a mockery of the senior actor.

The love angle comes early in the film when Ganesh falls for Sandhya (Sanchita) at first sight, who happens to be his sister’s best friend. Like the cliched stories, Sandhya is a neglected rich girl who had come to spend a couple of months with her best friend’s family (that happens to be Ganesh’s family). When Ganesh proposes his love, Sandhya reciprocates his feelings fast enough.

But there is another woman Valli (Suhasini), Ganesh’s cousin, who also loves him. And so, yet another love triangular story. The two families estranged for some unexplained reason, reunite at a point. And Ganesh finds himself in a dilemma caught between family honour and love. The twist in the tale comes with the favourite speed-breaker of many old films’ love-plot – Cancer.

The director weaves around the melodrama and a couple of twists. Prakashraj makes a friendly appearance as the doctor. But his scenes only end in generating the maximum amount of unintended humour.

Also, the protagonist fails to get audiences’ sympathy. The characters don’t connect with the audience, and hence, the hero’s miseries and trials leaves one untouched.

Among the actors, Jaiprakash manages to bring in some semblance of realism to his role as Ganesh’s father, despite the ambiguity of the character. Ilavarasu as the uncle gets his moments.

The female leads Sanchita and Suhasini have pleasant screen presence, and if cast in a better film, they would have made a stronger impact.

Jithan Ramesh seems to have worked hard on his dialogue delivery, which was a sore point in his previous films. The actor, apart from his initial couple of films, has had no luck in the selection of his subsequent scripts. And this film too falls in the ‘forgettable’ list, and his effort once again wasted.

Related Stories

No stories found.
The New Indian Express
www.newindianexpress.com