Direction: Siva
Music: Vidyasagar
Production: KE Gnanavel Raja
Karthi is the latest to jump the bandwagon of Telugu remakes. Dhanush has done it with fair success and Jeyam Ravi thrives on it. But could Karthi pull it off with Siruthai, which is the remake of the four-year old Telugu hit Vikramarkudu?
Rocket Raja (Karthi) is a pickpocket whose ally is Kaatupoochi (Santhanam). Together they perform con tricks on seemingly innocent people and when they stumble upon Swetha (Tamannah), it’s
Siruthai
immediately love at first sight for Karthi. Despite his dubious credentials, he perjures himself as being a software engineer to win the rich Tamannah’s love. His life is further complicated when one of his thieving expeditions make him bring home a child. The girl child identifies him as her father and there begins a string of events; Karthi is being mysteriously chased by blood thirsty, burly goons after the child’s arrival. Tamannah breaks up with him after the child’s entry thinking he lied to her about the child.
As one can see, the movie has enough potential to be presented as a no-holds-barred entertainer. Instead, the director borrows the Telugu version’s garishness and manages only to translate (sometimes even transliterate) the dialogues and comes up with a banal stereotype of a movie. To muffle the questions that would arise out of the language that is being used, the director inserts a disclaimer at the opening of the movie stating that it’s for the benefit of the viewers that every character speaks Tamil although most of the proceedings happen in Andhra Pradesh. But he conveniently forgets the other questions that would arise out of unreasonable sequences that fill the movie. Those might never be answered.
Karthi’s smile is his asset but in a movie that has little scope for such endearments, his qualities are of little help. There is one scene that pronounces his versatility. He gets annoyed and smashes the little girl’s walkman without knowing how precious that is for her. And he melts down immediately after revelation, embracing the child and cocooning her with his fatherly love. The last scenes, in which the character Rocket Raja dons the cop uniform, are also a riot. The actor pulling off two diverse roles with consummate ease is the saving grace of the movie.
Since the originality of the Telugu version is retained, when released in Andhra this movie might serve as Karthi’s launch pad in Tollywood.
In the little time he’s allowed to be on screen, Santhanam manages to break the movie hall into laughter with his wisecracks. Karthi and Santhanam complement each other as well. Tamannah is just another pretty face in the movie and has absolutely nothing to do other than look pretty and dance gracefully. She also seems to be willing enough to flaunt her navel area, much to the delight of Karthi and her fans. Which brings us to the songs; all of them seem to follow the same beat and are equally humdrum.
The movie is also riddled with crude dialogues; it would still have been tolerable if they were used only for comedy, but in the name of villainy the movie throws in some cringe-worthy dialogues and scenes that are sure to make the women in your family squirm in their seats.
Ganesh’s stunts are old-schoolish. Sample this: Karthi leaps out of a 10 storeyed under-construction building and lands in his two (feet). And we said it’s only a sample. Despite this, Velraj’s cinematography manages to tone down the movie’s violence with its subtlety (a quality that is otherwise non-existent in the movie).
Watch Siruthai if you are a hardcore mass masala fan. Chances are that you might like Karthi, who is trying his best to prevent the movie from its impending dive into the depths of hackneyed void.
Verdict: Another mass masala remake!
