Diya -  Completely bereft of Emotions 

Director Vijay after the successful horror comedy 'Devi' has once again gone for a supernatural subject with  Sai Pallavi as the central character on her Tamil debut. Whether 'Diya' and the heroine will attract the audiences remains to be seen.

Tulasi (Sai Pallavi) and Krishna ( Naga Shourya) are school sweethearts who have premarital sex and when it is found out the girl's mother (Rekha) and boy's father (Nizhalgal Ravi) force the youngsters to abort.  Five years later the couple get married and move into a new apartment.  The aborted child comes to haunt the house as a five year old girl and starts killing everyone responsible for her non-existence.  Tulasi realises that the final target of 'Diya' is her husband and whether she is able to save him or not forms the rest of the screenplay.

Sai Pallavi the celebrated 'Premam' girl at last makes her Tamil debut and she should be  commended for choosing a mature character rather than the run of the mill heroine.  However the script does not give any scope for her to prove her talent and most of the time she just goes through the motions except for the climax where there is a glimpse of histrionics on display.  The synthetic sounding dubbing voice is no help either for Sai Pallavi. Promising Telugu hero Naga Shourya has nothing much to do and looks out of place throughout.  R J Balaji miscast as a bumbling cop fails to score comically and also dilutes much of the credulity in the climax sequence.  Nizhalgal Ravi, Rekha and  Sujitha give the feel of a television serial to the proceedings.  Baby Veronica playing the ghost child is cute but has not been used to the advantage of the film.

'Diya' s premise of an unborn child coming back to haunt and kill those responsible is quite interesting in the beginning.  The climax holds some emotions that lacks in the rest of the screenplay.

On the downside, for a horror the film lacks suspense and does not gain momentum through emotions too.  Contrived scenes are piled up one after the other.

Sam C.S for his background theme score has given a melancholic twist to his famous 'Vikram Vedha' music.  The TV serial feel in the images makes one wonder if it was indeed Nirav Shah who has cranked the camera. Antony has done a fair job.  Director Vijay has disappointed by giving a movie that fails to connect and the below par writing is to blame.

Verdict : Go for it if you fancy different subjects and don't expect much otherwise