Kalaiyarasan and Sai Dhanshika are the young and upcoming actors who have given recognizable performances in a few films. They are yet to get a stronghold in Kollywood and for they will be hoping to get that with ‘Uru’ in which they have acted as a pair for the first time. Written and directed by debutant Vicky Anand, ‘Uru’ is a horror thriller without a ghost and let’s see whether the film is capable of strengthening the foothold of its lead actors in Kollywood.
Jeevan (Kalaiyarasan) is a writer who has lost his sheen. His publisher urges him to write something that will attract the young audience such as a thriller or a story about a anti-hero. Jeevan’s wife Jenni (Sai Dhanshika) has postponed her family life giving two years time for her husband to regain his fortunes as a writer. She loses patience and starts pushing Jeevan to search some other job.
Jeevan gets the idea for a story about a psychopath killer who does killing like an art and does not have any remorse about that. He pitches this concept to his publisher who in turn asks him to go ahead writing it. Jeevan convinces his wife to wait for two more months and leaves to Meghamalai to complete writing his story.
After reaching Meghamalai, Jeevan starts getting some unusual eerie experiences even as he keeps writing his story. Jenni turns up suddenly and the couple decides to return home as things don’t seem to be fine. But it is too late to take that decision.
To know why and what happens next, watch the film in theaters. Debutant director Vicky Anand deserves praise on various counts. His film stands true to the promise given in the promotion- It is a genuine horror thriller without a semblance of ghost or any other super natural element. Being a debutant, he has shown the guts it takes to do away with any kind of commercial compromise or unwanted ingredients that is not connected to the story. There are no songs, romance scenes, comedy and over the top action sequences that is not required by the story.
Even characters are established with the movement of the story. Screen time is not wasted to establish the relationship and background of the lead characters. They just come as dialogues at an appropriate juncture in the script and that quite serves the purpose. Even the name of an important character is not told to the audience with a dialogue just for making them know his name. It is revealed much later, in the form of a letter written by a dumb person to the hero. These factors place Vicky Anand among the new age directors who dare to make novel attempts and respect the sensibility of the audience as a creator.
But the major drawback is that the film does not entertain or engage enough, and it is definitely not for those who come to movie halls for entertainment or to pass time. The proceedings are too slow (although justified to an extent) and detailed that even the overall running time which is less than two hours, tests the patience. Predominant part of the second half is confined to a particular place with one or two characters. This makes it a taxing experience beyond a point.
The last half an hour has a lot of twists. While a few of them work out well, the others are of the kind where, the scriptwriter makes us believe something at an earlier stage and later says that it is not what we thought it to be and it is something else and there is a overdose of this hide and seek game.
Kaliayarasan is perfect in bringing out the frustration of a failed writer and also does a neat job as a vulnerable person in the early stages of the film. All other supporting actors including Mime Gopi have fit the bill while Daniel Annie Pope makes a blink you will miss appearance.
Director Vijay Anand has been brilliantly supported by three people to achieve his vision. Heroine Sai Dhanshika- who gets to perform a near solo act for a considerable portion of the second half and she has done a fantastic job as a innocent woman getting trapped into a house to escape from a killer, music director Johan with his intriguing background score that uses sounds and silence in apt proportions and cinematographer Prasanna Kumar who captures the scenic beauty of Meghamalai with some awesome top angle shots and also the transforms the chilling effect of the night sequences to the viewer.
Verdict: ‘Uru’ is an appreciably different horror thriller with good performances, music and camera. It would have been much better if the film had enough interesting elements to keep the audience engaged throughout.
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