For a general time-pass in Tamil on Endhiran you may want to go here. Now read on for the review in English...
I was telling this joke to Aishu this morning.
There were these two bearded gentlemen – one a proud Maratha and the other a gallant Sikh, travelling by train from Mumbai to Delhi. The compartment was empty and they got bored and decided to play a game. Each one would name an Indian Freedom fighter from their native land and will get to pull a hair out of the other one’s beard. Within minutes, it was apparent that the Sardarji was going to lose all his hair as the Marathi was reeling off the Tilaks and Gokhales as if there was no tomorrow. But then Sardarjis are nothing if not shrewd; in one brilliant move, the Sikh shouted, “Jallianwala Bagh!!” and pulled the entire beard off the Marathi’s face!!!
All ye Rajini detractors: Please do not play the above game with the Rajini fans hereafter. Before even you can start listing the Nayagans and the Gunas and the Anbe Sivams, you will hear a big shout – ‘Endhiran!’ and that is it; you are sure to lose, not just the facial hair… ok, this is a family site!
One went to Rex Cinemas in Singapore on Gandhi Jayanthi afternoon to watch Thalivar’s latest offering.
Full tummy? Tick.
Sleepy? Tick.
Pounding head-ache? Tick.
Heavy heart? Tick. (Why? Could not watch the movie 44 hours earlier :-()
As one entered the theatre, B was quite unhappy to see (a) a number of empty seats and (b) a number of families amongst the audience. What? 2nd day Rajini movie – empty seats? No buzz…Hayyooo :-((
Anyway, one decided to wait for the movie to start and start it did at 4pm.
The pace, the novelty, the relentless set-pieces, dashing visuals, intelligent dialogues and above all Rajini’s histrionics - it was like watching the first-ever ODI double century early this year by that Rajini of the cricket field, Sachin!
The next thing one knew was that the movie had ended! (I vaguely remember getting the pop-corn during the intermission – must have been vision-bleached!)
The story, as you would have read in all reviews is quite straight-forward.
Man creates Robot. Robot obeys Man – to the dot that is until Man gives feelings to Robot. Robot begins to go after Man’s lover. Man kills Robot. Robot comes back and creates havoc. Man worms, de-magnetizes, magnetizes and finally destructs Robot.
There is a very poignant end to the movie which is bound to make you come out of the hall with questions about relationships!
One hears that Sujatha had pretty much done the story and dialogue at least ten years ago. Remember his Jeeno story series (two of them)? Still quite fresh! Also heard that Shankar had to employ an army of 250 people to kinda update the whole piece to make it a bit more contemporary (1 TerraHertz, 1 Zettabyte etc.) Hmmm… what was Sujatha’s IQ again?
Rajini completely rules the roost. It is hard to imagine how Kamal would have fared in this role based on the initial casting. Neither would Shah Rukh have cut it. Rajini is the suave Dr Vaseegaran de Man and the Robot who himself has multiple incarnations - innocent(?) Chitti, love-smitten Chitti, scheming Chitti, menacing Chitti and the wise Chitti.
Prosthetics or not, he looks dashing and as usual, steals the thunder when he turns the villain in the second-half.
Yes, he does not spew out any one-liners; in fact Ash even makes fun of his ‘thanee vazhi’ dialogue. Rajini’s parents exactly have 90 seconds of screen-time. So do others – in fact that mosquito ‘Rangooski’, Sujatha’s nick-name, occupies more celluloid real-estate than Karunas, Santhanam, Haneefa and Kalabhavan Mani all put together! But one never notices these things. In the larger scheme of things, Rajini rules and that is all that matters!
Ash manages to hold onto the fast ride without much of a problem. She is definitely the most beautiful 35-year old in the world. No tongue-in-cheek there!
Yes, there are six songs including the mandatory adrenaline-pumper before the climax. Machu-Pichu is breath-taking and so is Ash in that song ;-) By the way, where was the Kadhal Anukkal song picturized? Dead Sea or one of those deserts in South America?
The movie is heavy on human relationships with quite an interesting characterization throughout.
Dr Vaseegaran does not reciprocate the ‘right feelings’ towards a beauty like Ash (aaarghh! blind or what?), Sana cheats and lies in the exam hall, the two side-kick scientists double-cross, Dr Bohra covets and pollutes Chitti… and all these are more than enough for an intelligent robot like Chitti to absorb and he ends up spewing love poetry on Sana!! Natural? You bet. Everybody seems to be doing the right thing at that moment without realizing how it is impacting the new-born robot.
The movie is heavy on technology. The jargons will not kill you. If you don’t understand them, fret not. Apart from missing a few insider jokes about IP Address, Nickel bolts etc., they are just there to give you a Sci-Fi feeling. The CGI is mind-blowing, on par, and at times better than other Hollywood movies. Remember the CGI was done by various Hollywood organizations and the proof-of-the-pudding could be seen at the end of the movie: for a full three minutes, the names of the people who did CGI, from India to US to China to India, just kept rolling on and on.
As a director Shankar has excelled himself this time around. While he could easily have made this into a mindless action flick (and still raked in the moolah!), one can see that he has struggled hard to get a complex script to the screen and has greatly succeeded in doing so. Hats off, mate!
Sivaji was a Rajini movie directed by Shankar.
Endhiran is a Shankar movie with Rajini acting in it.
Which director has done that with Rajini in the last two decades at least?
What do I hear? Chandramukhi? I cringe.
Leaving thoughts:
With or without Carpet Bombing Strategy, everybody associated with making Endhiran will become richer.
B was not too satisfied in the end. He mentioned something pertinent. Usually in a Rajini movie, people come to watch a human being do the extra-ordinary and they probably see themselves doing those acts. In Endhiran, Rajini does more fantastic things than they could ever have imagined – but it is not real you see: a man doing super-man stuff and a super-man doing super-man stuff has differences, right? I think that is what made him say, “I hope that this movie runs well, so that Rajini can come back for a Baasha-2!”
As far as I am concerned…
Forget all that psycho-analysis baloney.
Go watch Endhiran.
Twice.
Dot.
