Of time loop and tamil movies

Last week happen to see 2 movies based on time loop concept. It is a first for tamil movie world that a concept that is primarily seen only in Hollywood movies is being tried here. And that too 2 movies back to back on same concept. Possibly, I guess, the first one that got released, “Jango”, could’ve been the pioneer who thought of this concept while “Maanaadu” which followed immediately could’ve been an inspired from Jango’s team or maybe the storyline got leaked out. Between the two, Maanadu is hands on winner, both in terms of making, casting, acting, reach, publicity and also on BO collection. The similarity between the 2 movies, doesn’t just end with the theme. In both the movies, the hero tries to save someone from getting killed. While it happens to be the wife character in Jango, it is the state CM in Maanadu. In both movies, the villain encounters same time loop scenario as the hero, stuck on the same day. Whereas the reason for the linkage is explained cleanly on the former, there is no such clarity on Maanadu. That apart, both the movies are chalk and cheese in rest of the aspects. While casting has been low budget and performances below par in Jango, Maanadu has a dream cast with “God-knows-why-and-how-he-still-has-fanatical fans” STR, whose USP have been shedding about half a quintal of his body weight for this role, SJ Suryah who has given a rollicking performance, YG Mahendiran and rest of cast with known faces and usual suspects of Venkat prabhu’s (director) gang forming the rest of the crew. 

Jango tries to pack in multiple storylines into the same thread and ends up muddling the flow of the story. It has an asteroid, which actually is causing the time loop, aliens possibly, a machine (jango) that will break the time loop, a doctor creating artificial heart and other organs (villain), a hero trying to save his marriage, an unreasonable and irritable wife who is a TV anchor cum investigative journalist, bunch of comedians who irritate, songs that have no consequence on the plot and I don’t know how many more sub plots that I missed. On paper, as a novel, it might’ve been a much better version than Maanadu, where in all of these threads culminating into a grand finale would’ve been a perfect paperback thriller. Presentation is where Jango falls short with a newbie hero, whose facial expression seems to be stuck in a time loop of its own for the entire running time. With so many characters that require in depth back stories to justify their actions leading to a run time rivalling a web series, guess they made a major compromise on story telling. May be this would make more money if they sell the script to a Bollywood producer, who can pump in more money and make it a damp squib on a grander scale. 

Maanadu runs a tight rope walk in what it tries to convey as a story, making it a simple while loop – Hero comes from Dubai to stop a marriage and kidnap the bride to get her married with his friend. On the way, when their flight flies over Ujjain, supposedly the center of the earth before GMT came into being, the journey gets hit by timeloop. When he along with his gang tries to reach the registrar office to legalize the wedding, fate intervenes in the form of a dirty cop, who uses the hero as a scapegoat in a much bigger conspiracy. The cop, along with a corrupt minister, wants to assassinate the CM, create a law and order situation by portraying the hero as a terrorist from a minority community in India, instigating riots in the name of religion. When the hero gets killed in that situation, he finds himself to wake up inside the flight, which is still in transit. The same situation plays out almost a dozen times, with each situation resulting in either the hero killing himself, getting killed and finds himself back on his plane. By interval time, the dirty cop also realizes why the same day is recurring in a loop and how they try to negate the situations leading to the loop forming again, makes the riveting second half. Screenplay and editing are top notch for given the number of times the scene repeats, the director has boldly decided that the audience will be smart enough to understand the intermingling loops which makes the storyline racy. SJ Surya is always a mimicry artists dream with his voice and pitching. His dialogue of “Vanthaan..suttaan..sethaan..repeatu”  is already a hit and a meme gold mine. STR has underplayed his usual crazy gimmicks and has done what the role requires. The director has been very cautious in not over playing the religious angles or the political background and has managed a balancing act without compromising on the thrill aspects. Except for the sequence where STR escapes from a running plane through emergency window or the end sequence or for the justification as to how the cop gets trapped in time loop, the movie is quite flawless with no unnecessary distractions. For all the controversies surrounding it both pre and post release, the movie would’ve more than made up for the die hard fans of the hero.