Sathriyan Review

The super hit ‘Sundarapandiian’ and ‘Idhu Kadhirvelan Kadhal, Director S.R.Prabhakaran has made ‘Sathriyan’ after a pretty long gap. The film stars Vikram Prabhu who needs a hit to stabilize his career, in the lead role. Let’s see how the film has come out and what effect it will have in the careers of the actor and director.

Samuthiram (Sharath Lohithashwa) is a dreaded don who is extremely powerful in Trichy. He is murdered by Shankar (Aruldas) with the support of the local minister and police. By killing Samuthiram, Shankar becomes the most powerful in the city.

Guna is a bold and powerful gangster belonging to Samuthiram’s group and he is loyal to Ravi (Vijay Murugan) the next in the line leader of the gang. Guna is deputed by Ravi to be the guard of Niranjana (Manjima Mohan), the daughter of Samuthiram. Niranjana starts loving Guna and the latter after initial resistance decides to reciprocate the girl’s feelings.

But Niranjana’s family is against this love. Ravi opposes Guna, loving the daughter of the man who has nurtured them. But Guna is not ready to give up his love as he has decided to reform and settle into family life. This forces Ravi to decide to kill Guna while Shankar is also already baying for Guna’s blood to avenge the murder of one of his gang members.

What happens to Guna ? Does he survive in his battle against the two dreadful gangs and save his love? You get the answers to these questions in the rest of the film.

Director S.R. Prabhakaran has taken an age old story of a gangster reforming after falling in love and being advised by his lover. The story being old will not be a big complaint if the screenplay is filled with enough amount of elements to sustain the audience interest. If you ask whether ‘Sathriyan’ has that , the answer will be a partial yes and a partial no.

The first half an hour of the film, we sit hooked to the screens with great interest. The director has packed this segment with suspense and surprises. But after that the initial interest starts getting fizzled out, but somehow sustains the attention to the proceedings on the screen. The reformation part of the hero is well conceived and executed convincingly. These keep the entire first half watchable. It is the second half that falters big time. There proceedings become extremely slow. The action blocks involving the hero and his success or escape from a life threatening situation are not convincingly portrayed and they do not have anything new or interesting. The stunt choreography of Anbariv is way too average and fails to make up for this fault.

The film should have had more good scenes like the ones that came in the first half an hour. For example the interval block where the hero escapes from a major attack by a big gang of rowdies should have been portrayed either convincingly or it should have had anything that will make us forget the logic part and enjoy.

But despite these drawbacks, ‘Sathriyan’ is not a film that can be written off as bad. The film has its moments. The message against violence and rowdyism has been conveyed strongly and Prabhakaran’s powerful dialogues help him doing so. There are some noteworthy scenes even in the below average second half , the scene in which Guna visits Niranjana’s home to seek the permissions of the latter’s mother and the climax exchange between Guna and his friend who belongs to the other gang. Yuvan Shankar Raja’s brilliant Background score and Sivakumar Vijayan’s realistic cinematography are the factors that make this film worth watching.

Vikram Prabhu has done a neat job and is as usual good in action sequences. Manjima Mohan looks at her homely best and represents a girl from a second tier city like Trichy. When it comes to acting, she has done justice to the character. But the Malayalam influence in her Tamil dialogues is a turn off. Tara as Manjima’s mother has acted well, but again the Tamil pronunciation sounds odd. Aruldas and Vijay Murugan as gangsters and Aadukalam Naren as the police officer have done their part.

One why Kavin who becomes hero’s friend should have a love interest in this film as it does not contribute anything to the story. So the casting of Aishwarya Dutta and the scenes for the duo serve no purpose Also the actions of Kavin are not justified and that dampens the impact of his character despite his attempt to make it lively with his Nellai accent. Yogi Babu has been wasted with jut two scenes that does not infuse even bring a smile.

Verdict: Despite the slow narration and  average second half, ‘Sathriyan’is worth a watch for the initial surprises, some good scenes, powerful dialogues and a praiseworthy message against violence.