'Hero' (Malayalam)
Director: Deepan
Cast: Prithviraj, Anoop Menon, Thalaivassal Vijay
Much before the advent of television serials, mobile phones, tippers and quotation gangs, Fridays especially nights, used to be scary in this part of the globe. However, it was not applicable to the filmdom, which normally associated with many beliefs that the outside world termed as superstition. As a convention, most of the films get released on Fridays.
According to Aadithyan, (Anoop Menon), a Friday can change the fate of a hero or a heroine or a director.
So ‘Hero’ too arrives on a Friday to tell us about the life of a stuntman’s assistant (dupe) Tarzan Antony (Prithviraj) and his transformation into a hero.
The team behind the film needs a big salute for selecting the theme and then for those brilliantly choreographed fights. An extra applaud to Kanal Kannan for those scenes. In short, it is a tribute to those faceless men who fought a lost battle for the heroes.
There are a number of films with filmy backdrop and some like ‘Rangeela’ tells the successful journey of a junior artist. Nayakan (1985) by Balu Kiriyath with Mohanlal in the lead had a similar theme of a dupe turning into a hero. Ironically, another film released this year, ‘Josettante Hero’ had a still photographer becoming a hero. Moreover, director Diphan could not shrug off the hangover of the last film, ‘Puthiya Mugham,’ especially the plot.
‘Hero’ uses some famous action scenes in Malayalam films to roll its credits, but as someone said, the creativity goes missing after this as in the case of most films made here.
How will you feel when you meet a six-pack hero with a mindset caught somewhere in the 60s? A chain of hackneyed scenes in the script by Vinod Guruvayur makes the film predictable.
Thalaivassal Vijay portrays the role of Dharmarajan Master with the shades of Thyagarajan master, Prem Nazir’s dupe and a stunt master of repute, in a credible manner. As a six-pack hero, Prithviraj almost convinces us that he could trash a truck load of baddies.
One may feel it’s high time a movement started to save the heroes’ fathers in Malayalam films. As in ‘Mayamohini,’ here too Nedumudi Venu is the target of the villain only to make the hero avenge his death.
The film fails miserably while aping Tamil movies for a simple reason that those who speak Malayalam have a very different attitude to life and things from Tamilians. This is evident from the lines of first song which boasts the hero. Bharani K Dharan behind camera and Samjith at editing table did a good job to save the film. Many Fridays have come, but the fate of Malayalam cinema did not change and if things go on this track, Fridays will daunt us again.