The Road Review - An interesting thriller marred by blatant co-incidences

Trisha the evergreen actress of Kollywood recently made a huge comeback with films such as '96' and the 'Ponniyin Selvan' duology.  Her solo- heroine actioner 'Raangi' was also well received.  Now she is back with 'The Road' a highway thriller and whether it will thrill the audience as expected remains to be seen.

'The Road' opens with a random couple filling fuel for their car at a highway petrol station at night. The woman is arguing with her husband about his decision to give her jewels to his sister's wedding which they are carrying in the car.  After a few kilometers the car stops due to some fault and a gang of criminals headed by a woman murder them and orchestrates an accident.   So it is naturally concerning when we see the film's heroine Meera (Trisha) and her family planning a road trip and due to her pregnancy only her loving husband Anand (Sandosh Pratap) and son Kavin leave for the trip.  As expected a drunken millionaire's car rams into Anand's car and kills all three.  A distraught Meera has an abortion and recovers with the help of her close friend Anu (Mia George) and her estranged husband Prasad (Vivek Prasanna).  There is a parallel story of an honest professor Maya (Shabheer Kallarakkal) who loses his dignity and job due to a female student obsessed with him falsely accusing him of molesting her.  The depressed Maya's father (Vela Ramamurthy) also dies due to heavy debts and the young man decides to commit suicide on the highway by walking into an oncoming truck.  Meanwhile Meera witnesses another accident at the same spot as her husband and son's death and when she complains to the police there is no evidence of such an accident.  Meera, a journalist by profession, decides to investigate with the help of a constable (M.S. Bhaskar).  Who is behind the deadly gang? What is the connection between Maya's story and Meera's is what 'The Road' is all about.

Trisha carries her part well, establishing the closeness with her family in the initial scenes and breaking down after losing her dear ones.   She also shows intent when pursuing the case against all odds and tracks down the mastermind.   'The Road' is yet another proof for the versatility of Shabheer Kallarakkal as a performer.  With his meek body language he convinces the audience of the wrongly accused sexual offender and the love he shows for his father.  He is also very good after his transformation into something different.  Santhosh Prathap, Miya George, M.S. Bhaskar,  Negha Shahin  and the rest of the cast are adequate.  The actress who plays the gang leader is menacing while Vivek Prasanna's characterization is ridiculous. 

What works best in 'The Road' are the well choreographed accident orchestration scenes. The suspense is also well maintained with who is behind the racket.  Similarly the scenes where innocent villagers are used by the villains to operate the looted money are thrilling. Though Shabheer Kallarakkal's episode with the girl student seems as if from an altogether different movie it helps in building up the suspense to a certain extent.  

On the downside the same writer who has written a handful of brilliant scenes has also dished out blatant concindinces leading to an underwhelming climax.  The screenplay is all over the place that undoes some very good work.

The technical aspects of the film include the music by Sam CS and the cinematography by K.G. Venkatesh are complementary to the proceedings.  AAA  Cinemas has provided a rich look.  Debutante director Arun Vaseegaran shows promise on debut and if he works on better writing could well make a strong comeback in the future.

Verdict : Go for this interesting thriller that has its moments