Films of top heroes keep turning turtle at the box office. Big time producers lose out on their investment. But all this hasn’t deterred new entrants from venturing into the fray. The latest is Vijith, who plays the protagonist in his home production Raghavan. And it’s to the debutant’s credit, that he has selected a script and role that would go better with his unassuming looks, than the typical ‘heroic’ one. Paired with him is Radhika Malhotra (Namita’s cousin) who makes a comfortable debut as the hero’s supporter in his hour of trial.
Vijith plays Raghavan a youth with a disturbed mind. A topper at school, he had come to the city for his higher education, to fulfil his dream of getting a lucrative job in the IT sector. But it’s a big bad world that welcomes him. Disturbed by the pervading sexual permissiveness and promiscuity around him, Raghavan decides to do something about it. And what follows is a series of brutal killings. Coming under his scanner are philandering husbands and wives, couples swapping partners, hookers and their clients, and college students on their sexual jaunts (a bit too overdone here). There is no suspense about the killer or his acts, and it’s about how the murders are traced back to him. Vijith fits in ably as Raghavan, the director (apprenticed with Selvaraghavan) projecting him suitably. As a first work, it’s a promising debut by the duo.
The narration speeds up with the entry of the investigating cop Lakshmipathi. Manoj K Jayan lends sobriety and dignity to his role. Methodical and intuitive, he traces the clues to Raghavan. But what had made Raghavan, a brilliant student, and a quiet ‘good boy’ as everyone who knew him vouched for him, turn into such a inhuman killer? It’s back to the past and to an experience that had created havoc on an impressionable mind. The cop’s sympathetic attitude at the end is questionable. Incidentally, Satrumun Kidaitha Thagaval, a recent film too had a similar theme.
There is enough room for some explicit dialogue and scenes, and the director has not shunned away from it. The narration is crude, and some more finesse would have helped. The film may not have the greatest of scripts. But at least it doesn’t bore you, like many of the recent releases did.
FILM Raghavan
DIRECTOR Paranthaman
CAST Vijith, Radhika Malhotra, Manoj
K.Jayan, Sashi Kumar, Moonar
Ramesh, Risha, Cooky.
expresso@epmltd.com