Sandalwood smuggler Veerappan used to be a favorite muse of Tamil filmmakers. There have been several movies made with his story and background.
But in almost all films he was glorified, and after he was exposed as the merciless killer that he was, films on Veerappan stopped.
Now, after a long gap, a movie on sandalwood smuggler Veerappan is out. However unlike earlier films, Padhavi Paduthum Paadu is a political satire in which a sandalwood smuggler (Veerappan) gets amnesty and takes a plunge into politics to clean the corrupt political system.
Though director Ramalingam has chosen to take the movie in a lighter vein, unfortunately with the Veerappan saga coming to an end in real life, the movie fails to sustain the interest among the audience.
The movie begins with the smuggler Malaiappan (Ranjith) kidnapping a former Chief Minister Thamizharasan (Ravichandran) and demanding ransom. However the Chief Minister Veerabadran (Pyramid Natarajan) does not pay heed to his requests.
Eventually Malaiappan kidnaps the Chief Minister too. Here comes a journalist Sathappan (the real life inspiration is not hard to guess) to mediate but is really more interested in taking the huge ransom sum to be given Malaiappan.
The turn of events forces Malaiappan to change his mind. He eventually decides to seek general amnesty from the Central government. As it happens, he gets it. And he decides to jump into politics.
On reaching Chennai, he floats a political party of his own, as he gets vexed with the selfish attitude of the politicians.
He manages to win people's admiration and eventually forms the government. The rest is all about Malaippan teaching a lesson to corrupt politicians and setting the house in order.
Dialogues by Thuglaq Sathya are at places very fiery but at times very flat.
Unfortunately one cannot escape the feel of watching a television serial all through. Amateurish performance by the artistes, needless lengthy dialogues and songs for no reason literally take the sheen out of the film.
Ranjith is impressive and earnest, though at times he goes overboard. Anamika fits the bill as a glamour girl. Impressive of the whole movie is Manivannan who plays a politician who switches side quite often.
The director does not show the nous to handle such serious political satire films. He brings to his craft an elementary ability that seems good enough only for slapstick comedy.
And that is tantamount to practising for the Olympics marathon by jogging in the park. Satire needs punch and power. But that is sadly missing in this.
Padhavi Paduthum Paadu, in that sense, misses the wood for trees.
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