NAAN SIGAPPU MANITHAN – Narcolepsy put to sleep!
Cast:-Vishal as Indran, LakshmiMenon, Iniya, Saranya Ponvannan,
Jayaprakash, Sunder Ramu, Jagan, Pyramid Natarajan, V.I.S.Jayapalan, Madhan
& Others/
& Crew: - S/S/Direction - Thiru, Music
- G.V.Prakash Kumar, D.O.P-Richard M.Nathan, Edit-Anthony L.Ruben ,Producers-Vishal/Ronnie
Screwvala/Siddharth Roy Kapoor, Studio - UTV Motion Pictures/Vishal Film
Factory,Distributed by Vendhar Movies/Running
time-149 mins
Track list:-1.
"Yelelo"-Singers- G.V.Prakash Kumar, Megha, Chorus, 2. "Lovely
Ladies"- Singers-Gana Bala, Vijay Prakash, Megha, Aryan Dinesh, G. V.
Prakash Kumar,3. "Penne Oh Penne"- Singers-Vandana Srinivasan,
Al-Rufiya , 4."Idhayam Unnai Theduthe"- Singers- G.V.Prakash Kumar,
Saindhavi, 5. "Aadu Machi (Remix of Lovely Ladies)"- Singers-DJ Vijay
Chawla, 6. "A Restless Soul"- Theme
The story, backdrop and setting (Screen
play) Why would someone take a film
based on a relatively unknown medical condition “Narcolepsy”! A subject which
is more suited for a 30 min or 60 mins informative documentary even with some
real life examples. Look, even if you ultimately dare to make it a film you
would end up making a hash of it like this one! “Naan Sigappu Manithan” moves
from Narcolepsy to rape to infidelity and finally even to blackmail! Do not even
for a moment think I am exaggerating. The film starts with the visuals of a
moving train with four “Adiyaal” looking guys drinking in the sly. A policeman
demands that they should get off at the next station and “even” refuses to
accept a bribe to let them go. For this honest act the leader of the gang
smashes the cop’s head against a telegraphic pole by sticking his head out of
the speeding train! Then the visual jumps to Vishal (Indiran) who suffers from
the medical condition of Narcolepsy from his child hood. He is doted upon by
his mother Saranya Ponvanan (a teacher) who is hyper anxious to find a suitable
girl for her “ladla” boy Vishal! This poor lady is being typecast in this role on
a daily basis that she probably has even started living this role in real life.
Coming back to our story Vishal has two friends Sundar Raman & Jagan (the
comedy quotient) who are also his soul mates. Other than them Vishal has a simple to do list of 10 points highlighting
simple day to day activities which he is unable to perform due to this sleep
disorder. One of these is falling in love! Vishal’s mom and friends have hope
and the faith that he is cut out for greatness. How does he achieve this? For a
start by volunteering to stand in as a living specimen to a class of medical
students for which he gets paid a whopping 50k! This magically spurs our hero
on to earn money online by highlighting the symptoms of Narcolepsy. I really don’t
know how, but he somehow starts earning big bucks and even asks his mom to
resign her teacher’s job and take a well earned rest. Then yes! You have
guessed right, he and Lakshmi Menon fall in love after she refuses the hand of
an arranged marriage suitor and yes, you’re right once again she is a rich
girl! and….yes, come on, how did you guess that Jayapraksh is her father! Boy!
You guys are either becoming very clever or watching too many Tamil movies.
Lakshmi and Vishal are deeply in love much to Saranya’s joy but the villain of
the piece J.P, puts a spanner in their works by refusing to allow them to get
married. This time it is not because of caste, creed, color or even money but
because sleepy head Vishal cannot consummate the marriage and give J.P a “Varisu”
to carry the family tree! Isn’t this a new idea to Tamil cinema? Read on, this
director has many such ideas! Then Lakshmi and Vishal discover the magic cure -
“Water”! Am I not being clear? Vishal & Lakshmi make it out under water and
she conceives! Eureka! The magic cure for Narcolepsy is underwater sex! Now
that the decks are cleared we can all relax…but no wait, there is the first
twist to the story. One rainy day Lakshmi is driving while Vishal is sleeping
in the car and she gets brutally vandalized and raped by 4 men. Vishal does
shed a tear though, to his credit, even when asleep. After all, the director
has clearly stated elsewhere that a Narcolepsy patient’s brain is fully
functional even during deep sleep. We will believe his hypothesis and proceed.
Now who are these four men? I am sure you have guessed right the four “Adiyals”
in the speeding train! Remember? Even if you don’t I will move on to the 2nd
half.
Vishal is filled with remorse and guilt, that due to Narcolepsy, his
girl Lakshmi is not only in coma has now lost the baby too. Now J.P. and Co are
very upset and throw Vishal out. What does Vishal do? He revisits the place of
the rape incident and gets it all back by reconstructing the whole crime by
self imagery. He then decides to seek revenge by hunting down the 4 rapists and
killing them. He also discovers a pair of earphones is another miracle cure for
Narcolepsy as it shuts all other external sounds which could put him to sleep.
His friends help him secure an illegal gun and packet of Ganja (The packet of
Ganja remains unexplained till the very end). By using amazing deductive prowess
(which will put Hercule poiroit to shame) he tracks one of the four to a
mechanic shed by listening to a ring tone by pulling out his earphones for a
few minutes. He then chases him down to a building which is under construction.
How convenient no witnesses! But someone else (Spoiler. So will not reveal lest
you decide to watch this great thriller) outsmarts Vishal and kills the first "Adiyal"
but in the bargain Sundar Raman gets stabbed. Please don’t ask me stupid
questions like how he got there. G.P.R.S maybe! Then it is flashback time
Sunder Raman’s wife (Iniya) is caught being unfaithful by Vishal. And then
Sunder Raman is back mailing someone else. The "Adiyals" are all
threatening Sundar Raman. But amidst all this confusion Sunder Raman helps
Vishal find all the killers who are assembled in one place to kill them both.
Got it so far good! We will now proceed to the climax…..
& the Climax is a
bloody fight where the colour of blood ( Sigappu) is running all over and once
again the miracle cure “Water” saves Vishal and all the viewers after a bloody
ordeal of 2 hours and 41mins.
Acting: - Vishal as Indran has
done his very best in underplaying/overplaying and has tried to laugh, cry, and
do everything the director wanted him to do but the one thing he should have done
was not to choose this script. Which he did not.
Lakshmi Menon
May have been floored by the script narration, else there is nothing in
this story which can show case her acting talent. When she watches the film she
will understand why.
The rest:- I really don’t
have anything much to say! I feel sorry that a subject like Narcolepsy has been
stretched to accommodate all these talented actors to convey null!
Camera:- The D.O.P. has done a fairly good
job. His lighting and camera angles were adequate.
Music: - Songs have no place in this film.
They should all be removed forthwith and the B.G. Score in places was totally
out of place. Once again the sound of silence would have served the premise of
this film better.
Art : - What has this dept got to do with
this film?
Choreo:- Less said the better.
Stunts:- Average and nothing more!
Edit: - Should immediately trim about 1 hour
to save this film and the viewer from sheer boredom.
The ones that were
AWAKE!: - The first 45 mins can be tolerated as it did not deviate from the
basic premise of this film
The ones that SLEPT!:- 1)
The rest of the 2 hours had no bearing or connection with the premise. 2)
Vishal the protagonist was missing from screen for almost half of the second
half.
Finally to sum it all
up, a quote: “The best shot in this film is the first one. Not a good sign... After
the screening was over and the lights went up, I observed a couple of my
colleagues in deep and earnest conversation, trying to resolve twists in the
plot. They were applying more thought to the movie than the makers did.”
Left right & Centre:
- 3 walkouts during the climax!
Bottom Line: - Whatever one may say
this film is a classic example of stretching a relatively unknown subject like “NARCOLEPSY”
beyond tolerable limits!
Until next time,
Director Haricharan
Chennai
11/04/2014
No comments:
Post a Comment