It’s been a while that I wrote a movie review, and I simply couldn’t resist continuing that trend after watching 7aum Arivu. And as usual, this is not the place where you will find the story, but a detailed analysis of what I feel about the movie.
Once again, The Tamil film Industry has shown why they are the masters of providing varieties in movies and this time it has come from none other than A.R.Murugadoss, whose Ghajini had previously created a revolution in K’wood & B’wood.
Jumping on to a new field this time, he talks about a Genetic Engineering Student doing a DNA research to bring back a historical hero. I prefer to present my analysis via positives & negatives.
Positives:
1) First of all, the selection of the primary character - Bodhi Dharman. Not many people knew that such a historic character actually existed. In a country where all the historic heroes were covered in super hit movies in Telugu, Tamil, Hindi, Malayalam etc., I wonder how come such a character was left out. It was embarrassing that during the survey (in the movie) , Indians (more specifically Tamilians) were not at all aware of this character, whereas people from China easily identified his name. Infact, Bodhi Dharman’s wiki pages have enough information for it to be considered for a full length period movie.
2) Smart direction by Murugadoss made sure that there were very few dialogues in the flashback that he didn’t have to bother about the language used at that period. (The Tamil spoken in Ayirathil Oruvan by Parthiban was much different from the one spoken by Shivaji Ganesan in his historic movies, though both of them enacted the same character!!; Many people still don’t know what exactly was the language spoken by the kings).
3) Excellent screenplay and editing through out the movie. Though the end is obviously predictable, the road to the end was superb.
4) Selection of Johnny Tri Nguyen to play the villain. This guy has some serious stunts. Tamil cinema, which has seen villains who are womanizers, Roudies, etc., has now seen a villain who is clam by looks, and terror by action. The moment he is on screen, there is some change of pace in the movie and the ambience is heated up.
5) BGM – Harris Jeyaraj’s BGM adds more weight to the movie. Each and every scene has been carefully dealt with. For ex: When Shruthi enlarges the photo on her phone and finds Suriya on each photo, the back ground is very comical; The climax flight scene brings more terror effect because of the BGM.
6) A role for the Heroine!! – So, after some time, a Tamil cinema heroine had a role to play. Whether she did it well or not, is a different question. J
7) Crispy dialogues and not punch dialogues. Especially when the argument is on Tamil & Tamil History.
8) That Chinese song in the first half is very emotional. - A person who was chased and not allowed in to a village finds the entire village falling at his feat, yet calmly help them - This couldn’t have got better.
9) How can I not say about Suriya, who is growing with every movie? His efforts have well supported the looks that he has been given. The 6 pack body that he reveals during the climax is simply stunning. He IS indeed a director’s actor. I’m eager to see how he will be, when he attains the age/experience of Kamal Hassan or Aamir Khan or Amitabh Bachan and such legends, given the kind of varieties and skills he has displayed at this age.
Now let’s see what the problem is:
1) Songs, Songs & Songs – I’m not a big fan of Harris Jeyaraj even though a few of his songs are still among my favourites. His songs are becoming very repetitive and there is nothing new or fresh to enjoy. This is when we get a feeling that his stock is over. “O Ringa Ringa..” is the only catchy song, but I have already heard it in Dhaam Dhoom. The singers who sing for him, his instruments etc., have all been tried time and again, and its only boring now. The song “Yamma yamma” was the most needless / least impressive song of the movie. Till then, the movie was going at a good pace with the plot thickening and that love failure song was totally needless. Probably a 15-20 seconds melody tune would have sufficed. The second half too had a couple of songs that was not that greatly timed.
2) Shruthi Hassan’s Tamil: Being her debut movie (in Tamil), it would have been better if she had gone for a dubbing voice, than trying out her own voice. She got a role to play, and the movie is all about Tamil & Tamil Nadu’s history. She shouldn’t have tried her own Tamil so early in her career. Why do these kids want to spoil their dad’s name??? But anyways, her Tamil was better than SRK’s Tamil in Ra.One! Consolation price – Shruthi!!
3) Hypnotism all the way – Well, in the first 10 minute, we were introduced to Hypnotism and how the villain kills people with that trick. Then, he kills 9 police men- ok.. He kills more police officers the same way – oookkkk…. And there’s another hell of a fight on the main road, when he controls the minds of auto driver, lorry driver, a girl, a biker.. Come on… and then a drainage cleaner comes out and does some kumphu Stunts.. Hypnotism is not even 5 % of the Shaolin tricks, and there are more and more dangerous ways, which could have been told. The villain was depicted as some Hypnotism specialist.
4) For the above, the villain was almost depicted as a super dooper power man, who can control anybody’s mind and direct them to kill anybody else. Now, if this is the case, why did he release a Virus in India? He could have simply killed all the people using Hypnotism.
5) Suriya’s songs in his last 4-5 movies are becoming repetitive too.. Dancing some hip-hop steps with spiked hairs, in the middle of roads - we saw it in Ayan, Aadhavan , Singam and now here as well..
But, overall, I feel that the negatives are something that we can forget, when we have such a wonderful plot , gripping screen play and an action packed climax.
The main drawback for this movie has been the songs, and the love failure song was the one where the audience started to get irritated as that was like a 180 seconds traffic signal between 2 empty highways.
If we need to sell our Indian movies in International markets, it should not only reflect in the plot or subject, but also in the presentation. If a script doesn’t need song, then it really doesn’t deserve one. When you try and insert a song here and there, this is when a ‘classic’ becomes a ‘commercial’!
Overall, 7aum Arivu is one of THE best History based movie that I have ever watched and it has taken Tamil cinema & thereby Indian cinema to new heights. Just as A.R.Murugadoss mentioned during the audio release, this movie will make every Tamilian , very proud.
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