Tag: sivakarthikeyan

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cinema:tamil FRS

FRS: Mr. Local

So we all know what FRS is right? Good that would save us an introduction.

A romantic comedy that tears your heart apart

-12: Narration, the whole movie is a narration between Manohar (SK) and his french prison guard. Hate narration in movies, hate them, except of course when done well. This isn’t one.

-10: In the inmates vs prison guards match, SK is the only person who scores a goal; do note that this match happens in Paris.

-2:Sun rays will exactly light up in a way that it illuminates SK’s head perfectly before his introduction.

+11: French prison guards are considerate and listen to entire sob stories of their inmates.

<Debate topic, should TN audience be as considerate as the prison guards from France?>

+13: SK saves Tamil Nadu culture from ‘external forces’ who want to ban the celebration of Ayudha Poojai; ‘external force’ is name Rita so that it rhymes with PETA and thus slides in the usual jallikattu reference.

Most humor based are some current event reference or involves Robo Shankar trying to talk in English

-40.9: SK’s habit of calling his friends as Baby and Darling, if this trend catches on, you know who started the fire.

+2: SK is actually working in this movie  ( as a car salesman) and the companies he switch to are also in the same industry (automotive); so yes there are things that Rajesh got right.

+5: SK’s cute family is a good addition to Tamil cinema’s long history cute families; in fact the triumvirate of funny mother-crazy sister and dutiful yet ‘fun’ son is a M.Rajesh favourite.

+57: Radhika is absolutely amazing in this film, in fact we could say the only good thing in this film; she switches from funny to sentimental and back just like that. Add more points for the meta in-joke of Radhika playing a TV serial obsessed mom whose life’s aim is to have a selfie with a TV heroine.

M. Rajesh stands Meta Rajesh?

-45: Hero (SK, we will use interchangeably) meets heroine by road accident cliche

-26.78: Rest of movie is about how they will not apologize for the above said road accident, because reasons.

-20: Keerthana Vasudevan (Lady Superstar Nayanthara)  runs KV productions- a tamil tv serial production house that is housed in an entire flashy skyscraper (some 20 floors); the rent for which would take up much of the finances of the production house- a good CEO would first be looking to use resources better…never mind, I don’t think M. Rajesh really thought about the heroine’s profession, he just wanted a CEO.

Thanos Tamizhachi: The Snap That Was Heard Across Kodambakkam

+1: Surprisingly for a movie about local vs global, no IT employees were made fun of in this movie.

-45: The only strategy that Keerthana Vasudevan (which is mentioned as trendy name, so 20 years down the lane you see a number of KVs then you know who started the fire) displays is her emotion less ability to sack people. (again and again)

So she goes and sacks the lead star of her popular production but does not get the HR involved and that too under frivolous reasons? I mean…oh please just get on with it.

Maybe they should have made the movie about how KV started KV productions; that would give more insight.

+12: SK’s football capabilities in France are explained by means of a local football match

-12: Although his action capabilities are never established, we just have to assume that all heroes like SK are blessed with fighting capabilities that can knock down 20 goons minimum

-34: SK also has only one strategy, that is to capture the heart of the heroine by irritating her.

-50: Hero calls heroine Dora Bujji, heroine’s recognition of this nickname (later) apparently cements the fact that heroine has love somewhere inside for irritating hero.

-78: Hero realizes he is in fact really in love with the heroine even while irritating her; this is achieved by means of a “who will be the mother of my child type” emo-futuristic psychological game played by hero’s sister.

Hero’s sister plays the same game with heroine too. Crazy sister.

This movie is a horror movie. Really because it creates fear among those who think about love, also love is not clearly defined in this movie, just like SK’s fighting skills.

-33: All songs whenever, wherever, even in Paris; it also seems like they went to Paris for songs and then decided to shoot remaining part of the movie there.

-3: the inevitable Parrys-Paris ‘joke’ Come on boys! Time to write proper jokes for a comedy film. Like I mean…

-22: Hero is not very understanding and always wants to have the last word, nothing really matters in SK’s universe even if you are a CEO who has fought your way up, the last words always belong to SK.

Last Word Freak

-411: Sad state for KV, with all the irritations that SK is creating, the TRP of  her TV shows are now plummeting.

-101: Later, but not so later, heroine actually falls (in love) for the hero and maybe (although it is implied only) she thinks that these irritations are actually ‘cute and harmless’. Hmm does this mean..like…..

-25.4: The guy KV choses to marry is maybe not a guy after all and this is supposed to be joke and of course KV now runs back to SK, all opponents to SK will be no match for him. Although SK himself is your friendly neighborhood rowdy baby with cutesy family.

Unga Veetu Pillai Types

-97: KV points out that SK’s middle class fantasy involves having her leaving her job, making babies and looking after families and their crazy sister married; while he somehow now gets to run her company.

Although this is just a fantasy, we at the FRS believe that KV production at the moment needs a wartime CEO who would cut costs and focus on select things that they should focus.

We also would like to point out that KV Productions suddenly becomes KV enterprises and Nayanthara starts buying car dealerships so that she can fire SK again and again( which is her only strategy). I mean this sort of unwanted recklessness will never pass a sitting board.

I mean does Kollywood even care? No, corporates and companies are easy targets and thus make convenient villains.

Also readers must realize that corporates only want to make profit, while Kollywood donates all the money they make to charitable causes.

-41: For any film with Thambi Ramiah, yes we are being unreasonable like that, so for a movie feature to get positive points even after casting Thambi Ramiah would have to involve him doing exceptional work (highly unlikely) or like just don’t put him in movies and expect us to give positive points etc.

Yes sometimes we have to be unreasonable.

-2.5: For a movie billed as a romantic comedy, this is neither romantic or comedic; except for a chuckle here and there.

Audience is expected to feel romance just because they have listed Sid Sriram as the singer of one of the songs etc.

So what’s the current Kollywood guidance value for a movie to be called comedy?

One joke for every hour of runtime is what our extensive studies say, so 2.5 jokes in this movie.

Good job.

All numbers are incidental and arbitrary, except the facts provided by our data analytics team

Subam

Team FRS


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cinema cinema:tamil FRS

FRS: Remo

The last time we did FRS or the Fawlty (Faulty) Rating System, we decided that this does not in anyway add to the discourse on film, it was a cheap way to get back at films that we did not like.

But things change.

Maybe some movies still do need to be ‘tried’ by FRS.

We thank Sivakarthikeyan for bringing us back to life.

remo-sathyam

-3: Narration

-6: Narration by Sj Suryah

-23: Hero is jobless, but one respite is that, he is trying for a job. Job here is to become the next acting sensation.

-10: His friends equally jobless, their lives are entwined with the life of our hero; who has no life anyways.

-78: Irritating yellow antique car is irritating, like let us spend a moment on this; i guess this car whatever model that is (soon to be a quiz question) is the male equivalent of the yellow vespa which is the default vehicle of all Tamil heroines for the past few years. I mean I understand that this is done to increase the classiness of the picture, but hero can sell that car for fortune and make his own movie only. Edho da, this is the poor hero with antique car- kadhalikka neramillai 1960s trope.

-12: Hero has doting mother, but of course. No, ok let us settle this right here, just because we know that Saranya Ponvannan is playing mother should we like think this is the extension of all the mother characters that she has played before? How do you even convey the script to her? ‘Madam, this is the same thing that you did in OKOK and zillion other films”. Also all mothers are doting on sons, except when not scolding kid for not getting job.

-5: KS Ravikumar wants to make Avvai Shanmugi part two

-45.6: Hero can do everything in life except love scenes, because he is very shy yaar, no experience with other girls

-24: Number of Rajni+Ajith+Vijay references in the movie is more than the number of pages in the movie script (well this is a fairly passable assumption)

-10: Apart from the above mentioned references, SK (which is SivaK rebranded and dumped on us as an excuse movie character-regular hero) makes references to his own films, atleast most of them in his looooong career. No we like self referential irreverance and all that, just we are being extra unkind here. Yes our tone is set.

-3000: LOL Cupid uses iPad for project management. Like how are cupids able to procure these gadgets? What is their allocated budget? and how many arrows are cupids allowed to have? How do they decide on projects? No i seriously want to know! Atleast that would be more interesting.

-78.99: Love

This is where it begins. Cupid strikes arrow at SK, now he is in love with some random girl walking on street on the way to work. This could happen to anyone.ANYONE

-100: AIM OF EVERY BOY’S LIFE IS TO GET LOVER GIRL WHO IS CUTE

-26: Hero believes that he is in love, because director has arranged for cute breeze to hit his face while heroine goes past. Dei in chennai no breeze da and you are not standing in beach road also. Summa.

-52: Hero follows heroine to supermarket. Maybe he thought it was important for him to know her favorite brand of curd. many serious reviewers have written about the different ways in which stalking is advocated in this film, if we start deducting points for each and every attempt then this will become like one 2G scam number only.

-52:  after what seems like 11 years of stalking, hero finally wants to speak to girl thing, but girl is getting engaged to some pune guy at the same moment.

+30: Girls parents think it is good to conduct engagement on flat terrace, i mean this is the sort of cost cutting that one likes to do in real life.

-10: for an engagement that happens on a terrace, it is WAY TOOO GRAND, only elephants they didnt call.

-40: whenever such engagements happen, hero will come and stand exactly opposite to the stage, so that camera man can focus on his sad face cliche, also flowers that he brings will fall on floor in slow motion. We would like to cut more points for the roses, but being kind here.

-3: You guessed it right, guy who is not hero but engaged to heroine is an ass of the highest order, although this will be revealed to you later in the movie. Yikes, spoliers

-10: for us, we gave away spoilers.

-15: Weta Workshop,

-98: Heroine is a doctor. But obviously the every moment she is on screen confirms our fears that surely she got through due to management quota or being cute.

-100K: Cuteness. Default character toolkit for heroines, if you do not want to take the glamour route that is (however eventually that too happens). Will come and say in any court that cinema is the main contributor for some stupid men thinking that girls like these actually exist and yearn for them. Being cute is to be a puppy but in human form, you have to appropriately curve your lips, widen eyes, take 300/moment selfies, draw in smileys, basically do these things so that some male fantasy is satisfied somewhere.

Because self righteous men can be graciously seen as fans of ‘cute heroines’. In the battle for cute vs hot (hot being the other kind in the heroine character toolkit, which is basically baring midriff and grooving to folk songs in some rustic background and biting chilli in close-up), hot is actually more honest (which is like, this is what you want, this is what we will show which is again wrong. Dei everything in heroine character writing is wrong only)

But this cute variety is a major killer and casual disrespect and utter disregard for heroine’s intelligence and esp in this movie when she is said doctor. And that cuteness happens only in U certificate films is an even more troubling thing.

Again, how does director come and say, “Madam, you have to turn up on set and be cute?” What fakery.

-20: Hospitals have advanced to the level that now they are indistinguishable from day care centres.

-150: using a child’s illness to progress your plot. yes, this happens.

-20: All songs, whenever.

All songs look the same btw. if you watch on mute, you might think all picturisations are same. Also some three colour gradient is used in the songs, we dont know why.

-5: Prataph Pothen

-20: Hero is best reader of body language, he can see love in heroine’s eyes. Also he wont take no for an answer (maybe he has not seen Pink). Heroine after saying no many times finally says yes, because arranged marriage is for fools and ugly peoples (actual dialogue)

-60: Suddenly pune doctor becomes villain, suddenly hero also becomes bruce lee type fighter.

-80: Cheating and confusing girls is ok as long as you spend some 20 seconds being remorseful. Also hero’s mother believes that what hero does is actually valiant. Hero’s friend advises against it, the only sane voice in the movie, no wonder he is playing the comedian.

+20: Chennai, some snobs still will call ‘madras’ but yeah good outdoor locations, this actually felt like a city film because mostly was shot outdoors in the locations that we go and come on a daily basis, and chennai still has a lot of those locations, good use of chennai metro as well, but as in all movies, here also it rains whenever hero and heroine want to kiss. But actually in chennai, it rains only for three days or something. I guess this is a very PC Sreeram thing, of shooting outdoorsy, dunno just guessing.

-10: For everyone telling, dei this is entertainment da, it will be like this only. What da we shouldnt ask anything? And why should we leave our brains at home whole watching films, is that even a valid expression

-3: for every reviewer who used the phrase “leave your brain at home”

Atleast i dont know, i have never made a film, maybe it is difficult to make a film which is entertaining but not irresponsible, but state that with your ‘alcohol is injurious to health’ message.

We are actually sad that people are profiteering from movies like these, I’m all okie if such movies come and no one watches them, but this will be a Blockbuster Budhan and now everyone will continue to make them, hence we can never stop FRS, which is even sad.

All this sadness is making us angry. Hulk level.

Edho da. Be happy. You have cracked the commercial code. We are only idiots.

As in every FRS, all numbers are surely random and arbitary, they do not mean anything.

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cinema cinema:tamil FRS Uncategorized

FRS: Rajni Murugan

“Quick Gun, Make Fun”

A note on the Fawlty Rating System (FRS)

*Initially thought about in 1934, it came to fruition only in the late 2000s.

*It is the only movie rating system in the universe to be based on a Buddhist scroll that was actually written by an Irish traveller who had been an assistant director in the movie “Birth of a nation”, the scroll was curiously titled “The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari to make a Baahubali”

*The rating system is now named after the Irish Traveller, a small portion of the proceeds from this review will go to a bhel puri vendor in an undisclosed street corner for secret reasons.

*All numbers and words are arbitrary, mostly imaginary. They do not mean anything

A note on the Fawlty Rating System Ends

“Quick Gun, Make Fun”

-245: Movie begins with voice-over telling us that Madurai is not about violence, extortion but a lot of fun. Shows villain as extortionist, previous violence is heavily stressed, climax fight will make Roman warriors cry out in shyness

-32: Hero is a wastrel.

-12: He is proud about it, hence a hero. Also has friend who does the same.(soori playing soori)

+90: Title font is good. authentic.

-10: Real life sports be banned, heroes will always win no matter what their competency is, even if the movie is out and out about a non performing hero, still he will hit the pot at the top of the school culturals, so that flowers fall on his head (cut to title song “Rajni Murugan! Gun !Gun!)

-1500: Hero dresses himself as John Wayne, movie is not a western.

-12.5: If there is a grandfather, hero is the only guy compassionate towards him. Rest of the relatives (some 1200 people living in 244 countries) does not care for the old man.

-2: Hero’s father is a simple school headmaster cliche

-100: Heroine does not say “Yes”to hero immediately, so that we can spend rest of one hour in wooing tactics

-12: When heroine says ” I dont like him”, means she likes him, extra minus points for gullible father who believes in them

-67: For all the movies that employ the above tactic

+345: Heroine falls for hero when he puts tea stall opposite her house, yeah just because he tried, so easy, come on guys. This is the best way to get girl!

-10: Tea shop does not register profits, no proper inventory also (MBA shizz talking)

-08.56: Villain will be successful in his attempts with others, same technique will fail with hero, just because he is hero.

+77.9: One whole RajKiran sequence which is genuinely funny.

-58.9: Number of bad jokes more than number of good ones

-63: Whatever happens, hero will get girl (minus one more if you didn’t know that already)

+45.6: An assassin who should actually be working in PETA or Jallikattu prevention force, because he fears for the life of a dog when he is going to kill 25 people. Environmental token positive points.

-160: SivaK movies getting self referential already, boss his filmography itself is not even half a page, also all songs look like some song in his previous film, same what’s the word..ah..mileu.

“Family is core, dont abandon them and all that ok?”

 

That’s all.

 

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cinema:tamil FRS

MAAN KARATE: DEATH BY UNDERDOGISM

 

This film is strictly reviewed according to the FRS™, for more details on our completely unscientific way of watching movies, do refer to our Irandam Ulagam review.

Maan Karate

 

-10: Self negative points to our FRS team which could not come with a better title and had to resort to the Neeya Naana Gobinath School of inventing words like Underdogism
-1.5: The protagonist is from Royapuram, calls himself Royapuram Peter. How does the location help the hero/story? Now they have a ‘reason’ to have an opening song at the harbour lines. Other than that no use of location.
+37.7: All the songs, no really. With all those things happening on screen, you might as well set your smart phones to do a countdown for the next song. Them songs, not so classic, but still refreshingly good and tastefully (ok subjective) shot.
-3: Usage of Pondicherry French Quarter in song routine to up supposed classiness. Yes yes, that same painted retro wall with that retro scooter every heroine seems to be having these days.
-12: Wayward-wisecracking-notlisteningtoparents-still the talk of the town type protagonist
-4: portrayal of IT guys as people with too much money and too little to do, which maybe partially true but you have no idea about appraisal system. So take negatives.
-56: Wayward-wisecracking-notlisteningtoparents-still the talk of the town type protagonist preference of white skinned girls is proudly brandished and so he finds love too.
-3: fart jokes in lift lead to love
-5: Thirukural as groom selecting device is not only not funny but also insulting to the couplets.
-10: whenever a Godly-sainted-mythic guy offers a boon, humans will try to test the power of the “Godly-sainted-mythic guy” rather than ask anything fruitful cliché
+14.5: interesting plot which makes no sense in the end of it all, but still interesting.
-109: the underdog story which will makes all the dogs in my city hangs their head in shame, as said complete random guy making it big in life and all is okie and probably hope giving, but at the cost of a professional and no basis is only irritating, the proposed rationalisation of the same is clearly troubling.
+8: for Udhayam corn Puff
-56: No matter how many tournaments you win all over India and how many hours of practising you do in any sport, you will always lose to a guy(yes yes underdog) who has no clue of it all because he is doing it for love.
-6: Love is what happens in the fields of pune with heroine shaking required body parts, hero does shake too. <You can see that we are not being sexist>
-89: Completely watering down one sport in the name of comedy, which again was wanting in humor always.
+67: usage of the phrase “Killer Peter is going to kill you”
+12 chillarai: here and there some one liners which make you chuckle
-3: after chuckling you go into depression for chuckling.
+1: guy who usually plays the rich father of the rich heroine is playing the rich father of the rich villain #changes
+8: Udhayam corn puff (we bought two packets)
-120*2 : We bought two movie tickets
If you don’t care for the review and think that against all odds the underdog should win and love should finally triumph, then this review is not for you. This movie is however tailor made for you.
All numbers are arbitrary and instantaneous and have no bearing on the film, this review, the writers and the readers.
PS: the boxing stadium in the film is named after John Pennycuick, who as you might be aware is the builder of the Mullai Periyar Dam. One only wonders why.
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Uncategorized

LEAGUE OF ORDINARY (NOT-SO) GENTLE-MEN

My favourite moment in Varuthapadatha Valibar Sangam is when a cow falls into a well and how the hero along with the fire service rescues the bovine and literally wins back love form all around, as usual the hero gets more credit than the fire service; the point however is that there is some cattle connection to the coming together of the lead characters.

I would not be making much of an assumption when I say our comedy writers write the ‘jokes’ first and try to put in something of a story behind it,  sometimes it is not even something of a story; but just the punch lines. Thankfully VVS is not that kind of a film, it has something of a story; but only just.

Sivakarthikeyan and Soori play founder and secretary of a loafer’s club in the village; also in the same village is Sivanandi played by Satyaraj, the proverbial man who is feared and respected by all. Needless to say that the heroine is his daughter, ok I just said it.

Satyaraj must have the record for being the most underused actor in all the generations he has been part of, even the mildly interesting initial moments do not make up for the 100 mile long post interval section; the milestones being  the songs, which are neither good nor do they have any place near the vicinity of the film. But then nobody cares, they laughed, I laughed. I don’t remember for what I laughed, but I do remember laughing.  I even ignored a racial remark by the hero, and hence I spill my guilt here. Ok so guy drops into a well to save a cow but makes fun of a girl based on her skin colour.

Ok fine we shouldn’t notice such things or else they will try and make fun of us in the next film.

To try and list out the good things in the film is to describe in detail the garlands on a corpse in procession, but then a procession must have garlands.

Have a good time.