As always a film plagued by delays rather has a low profile release and it requires an extraordinary effort to get the box office ticking. Paambhu Sattai after stuck in production hell is finally out, has Bobby Simha, Keerthy Suresh and Muktha Banu in lead roles. Centered on fake currency and the politics behind it, PS is a wannabe thriller cum sentimental flick, suffers due to some uninspired writing and loses it sheen somewhere through the second half, nevertheless Paambu Sattai is a watchable movie for its intensity and some memorable moments.
A small girl spills a grain of rice during her supper, her father (Charlie) notices and gives her a slow but lengthy lecture of how even a grain of rice comes from a rice field, finally lands in her plate after the entire process without being wasted. It’s a beautiful explanation, but what drives the scene is how the director portrays the man’s poverty line with a minute long scene. There is another scene when Simha is in a dilemma if he should betray his conscious and sees a blind man lecture his son on pickpocketing, intense! Scenes like these get Paambhu Sattai going, even though they are very few in number. PS is the story of a man in desperation, how he responds to the situation and overcomes is the story said in a single line. The director has his task cut out in showing various shades of the movie, a fake currency scandal, a sensitive relationship between a man and his sister in law, his candy glossed love and all that. Somehow in the process of mixing all these together the writing becomes very predictable and loses its glam.
Bobby Simha is a simpleton who works for a can-water supplier lives with his sister in law after his brother passes away, falls in love in Kollywood’s most predictable format and to get out of the money jinx falls in a money laundering fraud. His desperate measures to keep everyone happy puts him in a fix, Simha has rather acted beautifully, his rugged and unclean looks puts him right in his character. The first half of the movie follows the traditional format of a guy who has to stalk his way out to fall in love, probably because it was in 2015 before Swati murder, maybe the last of the lot to glorify stalking even though the love scenes are cute and comical. Muktha Banu is Simha’s sister in law, in a tragic accident loses her husband and they live together much to the predictable taunts from the public and as everyone around ( Simha, Muktha, Keerthy Suresh) have a hard time when it comes to money, it’s up to Simha to make amendments.
The director’s challenge is to club the fake currency gambit into the relationship drama, he does it with somewhat in an unconvincing manner and that’s when the movie loses its hold. Predictable villains, usual corrupt cops, unwanted boxing scenes all these don’t have correlation to each other and they just stick out the essence of the film. Leaving those behind, the sentiments and surrounding dialogues win for the movie. Simha shoulders the flick with his lethargic yet strong acting skills, his conversational strength is the key as he towers comedy with Mottai Rajendran, sentiments with Muktha and Keerthy, action scenes with Guru Somasundaram( small character then). Keerthy Suresh has her task out as a hard working lower middle class girl, her acting scenes are very mature. Muktha is yet another underrated actress has a strong character, her sorrowful eyes do the talking.
Paambhu Sattai works for its sentiments, those desperate and intense moments – however it would have required more than that to do the magic. BGM and songs are linear and level on, so is the cinematography.
Verdict : Paambhu Sattai goes around family drama and fake currency, makes it a watchable movie.
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