Vivegam

This is the only film in my entire life, I walked out of the cinema before the Interval. Don't they even watch the film by themselves, before the release? Waste of Ajith's talent and every viewers time. Well done Akshara, only consolation. Scripts are very much dramatic. I don't usually write reviews. I am so fuming with anger, hence I decide to give a piece of my mind. Also heard that it is a box office hit...., you can't be serious.

There are directors who love to add excessive slow-motion to scenes. And there's Siva. He adds 'fast-motion' to his set-pieces. We don't get to see what's really happening, because the camera moves at lightning speed and so does the hero (all his movies have been about hero- worship with an overdose of family sentiment - this shtick has reached its tiresome saturation. It's 2017, not the 80s anymore!). The break- neck editing style doesn't accentuate the viewing experience either. Even if (some of the) set-pieces in 'Vivegam' are clap-worthy in terms of ideas, this jump-cut method kills the execution almost completely. Except for the hero who owns every frame he's in, we don't even know who's getting beat-up or killed.

Remember what Dicaprio had to go through in 'The Revenant' (the struggle in the cold, wilderness while recovering from injuries)? Well, Siva summarizes all that toil (and more, like doing inverted crunches) in a song where Anirudh screams 'Thalai Viduthalai'. Vivek Oberoi who plays the major antagonist and secret-society agent (I'm not kidding) Aryan, although welcomed initially as a neat addition to the ensemble, persistently keeps heaping praises on his arch- nemesis (who he addresses throughout the movie as 'Nanbaa') Ajay "AK" Kumar (played by none other than Ajith Kumar) a renowned covert (contrasting choice of words, but that's exactly what he is - he makes stealthy moves but he blows places up and shoots everyone he doesn't like) operations specialist, who's betrayed by his own team.

Aren't even the most generic hero-villain sagas more entertaining when the villain is always two steps ahead of the hero? Here, it's the other way round. AK has a solution for everything, and I mean everything. Before an idea even cooks up in Aryan's head, AK's already executing it. "That's AK for you!" - Aryan himself says this like ten times. As if we didn't know. Meh.

Yes, everyone including white Europeans speak Tamil (either via double-layering or directly) which is fine considering we can at least fixate our eyes on the proceedings and not the subtitles. But the accents make the delivery sound unintentionally funny on most occasions. The foreign actors do a very generic job and their dubbing / lip-sync is terrible. Worst, Siva is trying to follow the 'Bond' template but one that's strictly grounded to suit Tamil cinema sensibilities. So the hero doubles as a family man, the best husband around, who at times even fries onions at his wife's (Yazhini, played by Kajal Aggarwal) South Indian restaurant (based in central Europe mind you, yet replete with saree-clad attenders and 'Rajavin Parvai' singing executive chefs) when he isn't frying someone's head on his job.

Technical mumbo-jumbo is spat out from almost every character in the movie - each character in AK's team is given a one-shot intro scene (with an animated pop-up that details their work stats - Gosh, the funniest stuff you'll read. For eg. Skill #3 of the 'Head of Interrogation' - INTERROGATION!). The spelling errors are glaring - STRATERGIST for 'Strategist' (Really?); Mission Coun? Where's the T? How can you trust the instincts of a movie that can't even get its spellings right?

'Vivegam' also has the worst hero-introduction scene in recent times. Subpar visual effects try to convey the fact that our hero, who took his own sweet-time to mumble a few lines in Tamil followed by "Never, ever give up!" to a bunch of military grade officers, had just jumped off a lofty dam - shooting and adjusting his watch on his way down and swimming away to safety. Kajal's character is added just to elevate the character played by Ajith. We have scenes where she keeps reinstating how she is the luckiest wife in the world to have a husband like him, and the quintessential 'passing the inspiration' scene where she goads her husband to kill everyone who betrayed him. Heck, our man bothers to mouth exhausting monologues to the antagonist over the phone even when his wife is struggling in labor. Towards the end, even Aryan seems to have given up - he tells AK exactly what he plans to do and how he's gonna go about it (makes things easy, right?).

Bits and pieces of 'Surviva' are used effectively as BGM, while the rest sound too noisy. The climax set-piece, set in a cave, comes exquisitely wrapped with the "Holy sh*t!" moment. See it to believe it.

Verdict: Alt+Ctrl+Delete!

After their successful collaboration in Veeram & Vedalam, Ajith and Siva are uniting for the third time in Vivegam. This spy action thriller sounds like a much bigger film and looks really like a quality film too. Siva has made it a notch higher from his previous works by making this film abroad. He went on to make it a visual treat for the audience but unfortunately, Vivegam doesn't seem to be a strong film. The storyline seems to be inspired by Hollywood films but honestly, it doesn't matter at all. The main writing which is the screenplay really lacks depth and doesn't follow coherently the initial story. Whenever the film goes intensely it suddenly cuts to a short flashback or an unnecessary song which slows down the pace of the film. The racy action sequences seem to be really intense but it ends up with a sentiment scene that doesn't even work in it. Unlike the brother and sister sentiments in Veeram and Vedalam, Siva brings us the husband and wife sentiment in Vivegam. Placing sentiment in a spy thriller doesn't seem to be a good idea and it feels too much like a soap opera. Vivegam lacks logic in many instances and it severely affects the overall film even though it's an Ajith film at the end. Anirudh's songs are really refreshing but I feel it lacks necessity in this film. This visually high-tech film is depending mainly on Ajith's larger than life persona. He is the one who is making us watch this film patiently. Ajith's hard work and dedication is an extraordinary factor in Vivegam. Even though the film doesn't use it in its favor, Ajith is brilliant with his fit appearance. He is able to make it a watchable film. As the female lead, we have Kajal Aggarwal who has for the first time a much valuable role. Her character seems to have shades of the typical soap-opera female characters but her performance seems to be a decent one to watch. On the other hand, Vivek Oberoi plays the main antagonist Honestly, I don't feel him as a strong antagonist because he doesn't seem menacing at all. He is always encouraging and elevating Ajith with countless friendly dialogues. He forgets what he needs to do and doesn't add the much-needed effect to the film. Siva has made Vivegam strictly for Ajith fans forgetting the main engagement factor. We have a couple of fan moments to celebrate the star but we have very lower factors to stick with the film. After the interval, the film becomes not so interesting and it's only carried by Ajith's screen presence. Overall, Vivegam depends only on Ajith's mass screen presence.

Well. I won't spoil anything Let me keep it short and simple Good and tremendous effort by the actor And top notch cinematography But too much loophoes and missing plot Poor work in script And could have shortened the dialogue cause Seemed too theatrical Not worst but disappointing

The movie was supposed to be in an international action style ( almost like Fast and Furious) and it has failed miserably. It was just an awful one man show and not really logical. I personally enjoyed Vedalam, but this was just awful. Especially the slow dialogues and song scenes are just cringe worthy. Ajith has a lot of blind fans, fans who just love the person, his looks and personality, but have no idea of what acting is or the quality of it.They just support his movies blindly. Im someone who prefers a better acting rather than the big name actors. His role and acting in Vedalam was outstanding, but this was just too much. I hope he doesn't go for movies with a plot like this.