Thanga Magan - review

On a blog posting roll this month. So making the most of it :)

Dhanush is silently and slowly stealing a march over copyright for his Mamanaar's movie titles, who thrived not just with his punch lines but also with catchy titles. The other similarity being, he either picks his FIL's leading lady or vice versa. Edho..nalla iruntha seri.

If our daily soap Opaari..err..Operas are edited to fit in an hour of a story, which in itself is a tedious task for none are having that much worth of a story line, you would get the movie script of Thangamagan. Especially the post interval portion. Pre interval is mostly a breeze with Dhanush lipping Amy Jackson only to end up marrying Samantha, who is a revelation in this movie. Her romantic segements with Dhanush are just..avvvvv...poetic. Andrea has dubbed for Amy and is pitch perfect as Anglo Indian tamizh ponnu with english accented tamil talk. And she looks bit fleshy too compared to her bonish thin feature in "I" movie. But its Samantha who takes the honours. Her act as a middle class house wife, her interactions with her hubby as a newly wed, the way she shows anxiety upon his late arrival from office, her body language upon seeing KS Ravikumar and her disappointment and how she goes bright on seeing Dhanush are simply awesome.I loved the scene for the way she responds to the first time Dhanush says "I love you"...chaancela. The best part being, majority of her scenes hardly have any dialogue. Its just her facial reactions and body language response to the situation and the amazing chemistry that she shares on screen with Dhanush carries the show. Radhika has a blink and miss role and doesnt even get time to spend the glycerine fully. KS Ravikumar as the absent minded dad has an equally absent minded presence. Somehow it feels justified as most of the middle class dad's are hardly conspicuous and their presence is more felt in their absence. Its a short story in itself. Dhanush as college guy is yuck. Be it is hairstyle or dialogue delivery is shoddy and reminds of his role in 3. Meesai Dhanush has little to do but romance wife and beatup few adiyaals. Satish as the meesai shaved kannadi poatta hero friend has nothing to do. The biggest let off for the movie is the lack of a strong negative character. The fact that the duration being an exact 2 hours doesnt help to establish any characters for that matter. Anirudh has a special corner in his musical heart for Dhanush is evident on the songs. "Enna solla" song plays forever in mind after first listen.

Gils verdict: Blame it on the lopsided script, which, to balance screen time for Amy as compared to Samatha, dwells forever in first half only to cut short the actual story which tries to take off very late. The hurried ending and lack of a convincing villain are the biggest negatives for the movie. Probably Pongaluku SunTVla podrachay paakalam.