Kreedom -(Tamil Movie released on week of July 20th 2007). The movie came in with high expectations of being a Family Entertainer with strong parental sentiments.
Specifically about a father’s desire to see his son become a police officer.
While the promises are not exactly broken, they have been packaged with other surprise plot elements that might not gel well when sandwiched with the base theme!
Simply put, the treatment here lacks the class and hard-hitting nature that this kind of subject demands!
On the emotional front, Kreedom is a heavily diluted version of Cheran’s "Thavamai Thavamirundhu". In fact, with the cast for the parents being the same in this one too(Rajkiran as the Father and Charanya as the mother), comparisons are inevitable between the two movies.
But while Cheran’s verion was focussed only on the emotional front, Kreedom veers off into the territory of the Oft repeated theme of’Dada’movies in Tamil - More specifically, the ones where the hero has a brush witha local’Dada’ due to circumstance, and is then forced into taking the weapon to save himself.
The film sways between these two aspects, never really hooking the viewer into any of the two.
The first-half proceeds as a light-hearted mix of comedy and sentiment, leaving the viewers in a state of expectation as to how the story would proceed. Father Rajendran(Raj Kiran) has high expectations out of his son - to become an Inspector and bash up the baddies. Son Sakthivel(Ajit Kumar) isn’t a loafer(thank god for that! That would have been the height of cliches!), and is sincere in his quest to join the police force.
Romance is peppered in, with Trisha as the bubbly girl, falling flat for the hero.
The director takes the easiest path to establishing their love, with both the hero & heroine falling for each other after just a couple of run-ins.**But why exactly is Ajith stealing a’Pillayar’ statue to establish the customary introductory song!
*It’s a lot easier on the viewers that Rajini’s customary introductory songs these days are shown as a dream sequence!Much better than messing with the plot to suit a hero’s image!
But once the key plot twist is established at the interval juncture, the post-Interval portions fail to build on the momentum and leave a lot to be desired. The comedy tracks in this session, just after the serious pre-interval event chould have been better interspersed with the main theme of the movie.
And I couldn’t help keep wondering why Raj Kiran doesn’t understand(or do anything to understand) his son’s state of mind.
Yeah, he’s a true police officer who doesn’t spare even his son when it comes to’breaking the law’, but some amount of discretion on his part would have made the plot work better!
Blindly believing that Ajith was taking to rowdi’ism seemed out of place for his characterization.
The villains are also reduced to caricatures, with all their yelling and swearing for revenge. While they are out on a blood-hunt for hero Ajith, he coolly goes around town to movies with his entire family! The plot angle used to keep the villain’s henchmen away for such a long time should have been more convincing.
And why doesn’t Raj Kiran send his entire family away with Ajith, when he knows very well that the villains would use his family to get to Ajith! Loop holes like this make the second half really a pain to digest!
Vivek tries his best to come up with a comedy track and succeeds partly. His antics while harassing the public and the imitation of Vijakanth in the second half provide a few hearty laughs. But on the whole his role isn’t enough tobe mentioned as a separate comedy track.Santanam the other comedian has some witty one-liners and disappears almost entirely in the second half.
Overall, the pluses for the movie lie in its relatively fast pace especially in the first half and the regular doses of sentiment. For Ajith fans, the movie would be a treat after the debacle of the abysmal’Tirupathi’ and’Aalwar’.
The cast:
Trisha plays her part well, doing what she does best.
Nothing much to say about Ajith - His screams in the second half evoked no sympathies, but that could have been due to thediluted script too. But he should get it sooner or later into his mind that he’s no Vikram or Kamal Hassan while signing up
for scenes involving crying and frustration. He desperately needs to work with a big director to bring out the best in him!
Rajkiran is the strong point of the movie - Put in a weak substitute for the role and the movie would meet with the same fate
as the recent(Dhanush’s) "Parattai."!
He essays as the role of a doting father with comprehensive ease. But there’s a deja-vu feel to his role, thanks to theThavamai Thavamirundhu hangover. Moreover, the script doesn’t give him enough opportunities to exhibit his full potential.
Sharanya, Vivek, Santhanam and others share the space.
*Cinematography and music:
*The cinematography is a huge plus to the movie - The hues, camera angles and fast flowing action sequences save manycliched sequences from being drab experiences.
The background score by GV Prakash also deserves mention, though it’s nowhere in the league of what AR Rahman had churned out
(and still does) in his initial years. The re-recording is also of high quality and created overall impact.But the songs didn’t appeal much.
Direction:
Director Vijay has definitely come out strong in parts, especially the scenes revolving around the Father-son sentiment, but has failed to deliver a cohesive feel to the blending of action and sentiment. A variety of plot gaffes dilute the much-needed impact in this genre. And the ending made me feel manipulated. For a real strong film in this genre, go watch Vishal’s’Sandakozhi’. A similar storyline but rendered flawless by gripping narration!
btw, can someone tell me the vague reference to the title’Kireedam’ for this movie?
If it has to do with the metaphor of the hero being handed over a’Kireedam’(Crown) by the people and forced to behave accordingly, sorry, the screenplay doesnt establish this as powerfully as it should have!
Has it become a trend that apathy for the hero and tragic undertones create a better impression among theaudience when they leave the theatre?
I, for one, feel otherwise. Without a proper plot build up, a plot twist in the end only irritates the audience!
Kireedam is strictly for the movie buffs. The rest can check it out once if they have some time to kill, but better not go in with high expectations for a family tear-jerker! Don’t you trust the trailers!