Arjun at 52, looks suave while donning the role of a super-cop in his 150th film. His character, Ranjith Kalidoss, is packaged neatly. The man is brand-conscious (superb job on the costumes), has a charming (and much younger looking) wife and enjoys playing superhero-dad to her little daughter.
The choice of a cop role for an actor commonly addressed as 'Action King' isn't exactly one that startles. Although the movie deals with the premise of a serial killer, Nibunan is quintessentially a star- vehicle, crafted with reasonable flair to justify a viewing. There's a mass intro-scene where Ranjith towers over his contemporaries Joseph (Prasanna) and Vandhana (Varalaxmi) in terms of shooting skills, and cracks jokes with them when they chill out afterwards. Ranjith's wife (the gorgeous Shruthi Hariharan) is an abstract- artist and although their age difference might appear jarring on the onset, the writing helps portray the couple's bond effectively.
Coming to the core premise, the first half is neatly done. The build-up is exquisite, the shots are slick and there are no over- done scenes. The thrills are slightly lacking in the second half and since the audience already knows that Ranjith is a 'super-cop' who gets even the toughest job done in like "five minutes", the intensity of the moment is hardly felt. It is probably the result of having watched plenty of serial-killer thrillers (from both Tamil and other languages) in the past that one doesn't feel the jolt when the identity of the psycho-killer is revealed during the climax. While the performances by the ensemble, cinematography (by Arvind Krishna) and editing (Sathish Surya) are uniformly even, the song compositions (by Navin S) sound tumultuous.
The film ticks off most psycho killer essentials: a motive of revenge, gruesome murders, clues that are like puzzle-pieces. Thankfully, it doesn't have a "celebratory bar song" or "item number". Plus, the women protagonists are fleshed out quite well. These are good enough reasons in my books for 'Nibunan' to be given a try (if you ignore some of its typical star-film flaws).
Verdict: Engaging, but do not expect anything breathtakingly intricate like 'D 16', or 'Yuddham Sei'. More (straight-forward in its approach) like a 'Vettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu'.
