Creativity and imagination have
always been the hallmark of film-making. There is a constant churning of the
minds with each film-maker trying to out-do the other and also out-doing
oneself. Brothers is a tale of director K V Anand outdoing himself compared to
his former outings: Karthavyam, Veedokkade and Rangam. This year is still wearing
a lean patch with only couple of surprises from Tollywood – The ultimate revenge story of a
little creature amused us and a youngster playing a Good Samaritan by
recovering the stolen money from a bank bemused us. Apart from these two there
aren’t any praise-worthy cinematic moments and the gap has been widened.
Brothers (dubbed version of Tamil
film Maattran) tries to fill this gap with its novelty. Spreading the message of
social awareness through films has become a tight rope walk for film-makers,
and embedding this message in a commercial potboiler is a task that seems to be
herculean. Anand's first film was on water crisis; his second venture was on drug and diamond trafficking; then he made a thumping impression with his take on youth politics and naxalites in his third offering; and now he tries to strike the genetic-engineering chord alongside other elements in Brothers. As most of you know, the movie is a story of
conjoined twins, but the movie traverses through multiple sub-plots such as USA and USSR bilateral relations, Olympic Games, some historical
incidents from world war that give it a thriller-ish tinge. Sometimes, you get a feeling that is this film a
sequel to 7th Sense??!
The way conjoined twins with contrasting personalities live; their way of showing affection to each other; different moments surrounding them; were shown with precision. You never get a feeling that you are watching a hero-donning-a-dual-role film. The way writer duo SuBha etched the characters of the twins show their mastery over the craft. You laugh with them, you cry with them, you pray for them when they are in trouble esp. during the pre-interval fight sequence on a giant wheel, you see them as if two different people are portraying the role of twins – thanks to VFX and slick editing. But as the story moves on many unanswered questions pop in the viewer’s mind. The director addresses all of them with a heart-touching pre interval sequence.
The way conjoined twins with contrasting personalities live; their way of showing affection to each other; different moments surrounding them; were shown with precision. You never get a feeling that you are watching a hero-donning-a-dual-role film. The way writer duo SuBha etched the characters of the twins show their mastery over the craft. You laugh with them, you cry with them, you pray for them when they are in trouble esp. during the pre-interval fight sequence on a giant wheel, you see them as if two different people are portraying the role of twins – thanks to VFX and slick editing. But as the story moves on many unanswered questions pop in the viewer’s mind. The director addresses all of them with a heart-touching pre interval sequence.
The first half takes the
movie-watching experience to sky high and the viewer expects more from the
later half. But the tables turn and the movie loses its fizz slowly. Around 45
minutes of the time is occupied by overseas locales and restless action. Some
historic incidents are plugged in this fiction drama, and an action scene suddenly
slips into a scene revealing a mystery, and this goes on. Though the end
product is a seamless mosaic of action scenes, the audience reaches a point of
saturation and can’t stomach any more. Adding insult to the injury is the
antagonist’s mystery which is revealed in the first half and the later half is
set-up to break his nexus. But one good thing about the second half – it adds a
Hollywoodish flavor to the film.
Surya Sivakumar shines as a happy-go-lucky-dude.
He fires all his cylinders in action and emotional scenes. When an actor plays two
contrasting characters that are juxtaposed on screen, it’s difficult to fix the
emotions. Surya does it with aplomb and his effort is commendable. He’s
mastered the art of cherry-picking challenging roles. Kajal Agarwal gets a
decent and justified role. The one who steals brownie points from other actors
is Sachin Khedekar with his role that’s got multiple hues. Anand’s way of
shooting picturesque songs in post-cardish locations moves up another notch. Sounder
Rajan’s camerawork that is classy and knew
no bounds. He should be appreciated for his angles, frantic pace and
lighting in the scenes involving conjoined twins. He shows his prowess in the brilliantly shot
song sequence Rani Nanni in exotic locales of Norway. Harris Jayraj impresses with seemingly different background score - the fusion of sitar, flute, tabla, etc. with their western counterparts can be
felt in many places.
Bottom-line: Brothers is a film
that wants to tell so many things in its run time of 3 hours. Had the elements
been spread over some time, the viewer could have got an out of the world experience.
The movie HIPed the flagship scene of Sriram Raghavan’s Ek Hasina Thi and
also a plot element from A Scandal in Belgravia of Sherlock TV series on BBC
One. Watch
the movie for some stupendous moments of film-making, Surya’s electrifying performance
as conjoined twins, father-son relationship, adrenaline rushing action
sequences, international locales, unconventional yet emotional climax, and
above all ‘the social message.’ Albeit the key strengths of the movie were not used to their optimum, it's no less than a wonder!!
My Rating: Expectation – 8/10;
Reality – 6/10
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