Penguin – movie review

Even before the dust could settle on OTT platforms vs theaters, the kind of movies that had been released on OTT’s would surely make them think twice before buying anything new. Be it Ponmagal Vanthaal or Gulabo Sitabo were not worth the ad money spent. Add “7500”, “Bad boys for Life” and “Penguin” to that list it only makes one wonder who the hell is in charge of Amazon prime’s movie buying department. If 7500 was a B grade movie, where the director forgot to make the rest of the half hour including the climax, only to sell it for half price to Amazon, Bad boys was Bad right from its title till name scrolls at the end. It is a potpourri of all things that was bad with Bollywood and kollywood of the 90’s. Dabba screenplay, lifted and shifted scenes from every movie known and the end credit where Will Smith son is marked as potential candidate for the next installment was anything but Banal.

Penguin could’ve bucked the trend if only the casting had been taken care. Much has been thrashed about the police station interview scene with one of the villains. But I found it very novel and would’ve worked wonders had it been set with better actors and much better dialogue. While the main villain’s reason for kidnapping the kid and holding on to him for 6 years lacked any sense at all, involving Charlie chaplin face and brutally killing kids at the initial scenes had no connection at all with the movie. Guess the director thought of the movie on multiple collection of interesting scenes and added bits and pieces of scenes in between to project it as a complete movie. Keerthy suresh can forget this movie and better watch out on her team. A better make up crew is the need of the hour for her. Rest of the cast are all new and to sum up their effort in one line, they’ve all wasted a golden opportunity to shine. Movies like these bring out the surprise new faces who often go on to chart their own course. Despite having so many characters, none of them live up to it. Songs were mere extension of the torture on screen. The only thing that worked for the movie was its title. Just like bird which can neither fly nor move fast, ditto goes for the story and unlike the bird that can swim, the story drowns on the idiocy of loop holes in narration and wasted effort of casting.