PENCIL MOVIE REVIEW

Surely there would have been instances in school when a long lost pencil suddenly manifests itself in the corner of your bag. Well, such is the case with this G.V.Prakash and Sri Divya starrer directed by Mani Nagaraj. It also features VTV Ganesh, T.P.Gajendran, Balaji Venugopal, Ravi Prakash and Abishek Shankar in other supporting roles. Debutant Sharik Hassan has played the antagonist. Music is composed by G.V himself while the camera work has been handled by Gopi Amaranth. Anthony has taken care of the editing process.

Pencil is set in the background of a school and the plot completely revolves around the members of that school. The setup of the film comprises of expected elements such as a crush, initial rejection and final acceptance between the two leads. Rivalry between G.V and Sharik interweaves.

G.V.Prakash plays the role of the school's topper and Sri Divya, his crush, is the sensible class beauty. Sharik plays role of a spoilt rich kid,Nithin, whose evil antics are a degree higher than the average school thug's. The mysterious murder of Nithin before the interval lends scope for the story to develop in the second half while GV and Sri Divya try to find the killer.

The cast has been chosen judiciously, with everyone giving flawless performance. G.V and Sri Divya have played their roles aptly. Sharik has to be commended for his genuine portrayal of the antagonist. VTV Ganesh's comedy works mostly as is the case with T.P.Gajendran, adding flavour. The director must be appreciated for choosing to experiment with a school based script at this juncture in Kollywood.

The film has few genuine moments that evoke laughter, school memories and serious thoughts on the education process. There are however major portions of the film where one might feel that the director has not stayed true to the premise of the story. The plot fails to build substantial suspense and fizzles out with a short and unceremonious climax.

Music has been handled well by G.V and the cinematography walks hand in hand with the script.  Overall the movie needs  more depth and could have avoided straying away from the premise in which the characters were setup.