VISITOR COLUMN

Multi star movies are generally interesting movies, especially, if both the stars happen to be more or less super stars, then the hype is beyond imagination. The result is JILLA – a combination of two renowned actors in their own way – VIJAY & MOHANLAL. Vijay is known for delivering mass entertainment movies and Mohanlal is someone who likes to experiment with his roles. So, if these two have to come together, then there should be a good story which should not only please one section of the crowd, but should also appeal to everyone. JILLA does just that.

Debutant director Neason has successfully brought in two heavy duty performers and has managed to tie a story revolving them, while also carefully ensuring that he has created scenes which would please the fans of both the actors. Firstly, Mohanlal – he needs no introduction – he can do just about anything. The inclusion of Mohanlal has certainly added a huge weight to the movie. He plays the role of SIVAN, with shades of grey, who wants to be the only person controlling MADURAI. More than uttering dialogs, Mohanlal scores in his expressions. Vijay plays the role of SAKTHI, Sivan’s adopted son, who wants to be just like his dad. Things take a turn when Vijay is forced to become a cop and after a point, he turns against his own dad. The storyline is not something we have not seen at all. But seeing these two stars perform makes it interesting.

Kajal Agarwal plays Vijay’s love interest and to the maximum extent possible, the director has tried not to make this character as a caricature. Soori comes as the friend of Vijay, who does not get much opportunity to prove his comic sense. However, with the little timeframe he got. Its good to see Sampath in a substantial role outside a VENKAT PRABHU movie and his dialogues deserve mention. When this characters justifies his actions from his point of view, you seem to agree. Nicely etched character, though it gets the regular treatment of a villain.

Mahat & Nivedha Thomas, who play siblings to Vijay, are just apt. Poornima Bhagyaraj does not have much to do. Pradeep Rawat has been under utilized. The story moves at a brisk pace with all the necessary ingredients for a commercial movie. However, the song placements are a big letdown. That is not to say that IMMAN has done a bad job, its just that atleast couple of songs could have been done with. The BGM is OK. Stunts are OK.

Vijay’s career has swung in different ways. There was a period where he kept giving back-to-back hits with his romantic movies and there was a period where his movies did not do well continuously. But, one has to admit, that after VELAYUDHAM, Vijay’s career has changed for good. We can see a distinct change in the roles he has played after VELAYUDHAM. However, in some of the portions of this movie, his dialog delivery brings in a kind of déjà vu as if we were watching POKKIRI movie. This could have been avoided. The dialogs in general are not so great, except in some of the scenes. With two huge stars, the need for having stronger dialogs becomes important. Sadly, its not to be found here. There are also some illogical scenes, but the performance of these two stars makes you forget those things.

Overall, this is a paisa vasool movie with Vijay and Mohanlal equally taking the credits – not to forget the director as well, who has done a fair job in managing these two stars and also delivering what was expected to the maximum possible extent. Had couple of songs been trimmed, and the dialogs were worked upon, this would have been even more bigger.

Bharathwaj Krishnamoorthy - A Lover of cinema.