With many theater complexes screening Raghavan and Kodathe Kottalira in adjacent screens one gets the feeling of being in Chennai with Kamal Haasan and Premji Amaran and the rest of the Chennai 28 gang looking down at you from posters.

Raghavan has been declared a success but the Chennai 28 version may not meet with a similar verdict. First it lacks the star pull that Kamal brings. Added to that is the fact that audience are pointing a finger at the lack of nativity in the movie. Quite natural as the original was made keeping the youth of Chennai in mind. Also, this one being a comedy, the dubbed dialogues might not have the same effect with the extremely vital timing of the punch line getting affected. Even a fraction of a second’s deviation can take the zing off a joke.

But all said and done it is indeed commendable that a movie made by a team of rookies (they are no longer that in Tamil cinema) has been dubbed and released quite extensively in Andhra Pradesh. And, who knows…. When the original was released in Tamil Nadu it took a week or two before public opinion began to grow in it’s favor and it never stopped growing until Sivaji came along. With no Sivaji in sight in Andhra Pradesh the Telugu Chennai 28 might just mature like wine and become a hit.