Film Review: SINGAM (சிங்கம்)

Cast: Surya, Anushka Shetty, Prakash Raj, Nassar, Vivek, Manorama, Radha Ravi, Vijayakumar, Krishna Priya, Bose Venkat, Nizhalgal Ravi, Yuvarani
Director: Hari

The Story: Durai Singam (Surya) is a Sub Inspector of Police. He is in charge of the police station at Nallore, a town in the Thoothukudi District of Tamil Nadu. Their family owns a provision shop and Durai Singam would have been more than happy to run it. But he becomes a police officer as it is his father’s (Radha Ravi) dream. DS is symbolically compared to Singam - the lion in Tamil - and how it safeguards its territory. He handles the police station with absolute ease. Most of the people who come there with complaints are either relatives or friends of the family. DS does his best to bring compromises between the dissenting parties and sends them home happy. There are also times when men try to break the law only to have their backs broken by DS. Kavya (Anushka Shetty) is from Chennai who visits Nallore and falls for the policeman. Mayil Vaaganam (Prakash Raj) runs a huge crime racket in Chennai. He threatens rich businessmen to part with crores of rupees in the name of kidnapping. The film follows the story of how Durai Singam and Mayil Vaaganam get face-to-face in the first place, considering that one is from Nallore and the other from Chennai and the result of that meeting.

Our Perception: The film is a total masala flick but a great fun watch. The film belongs throughout to Surya with Prakash Raj pitching in about 30%.

Surya is handsome, dashing, has a screen presence and acts fabulously with an excellent diction. He can sing, dance, romance, fight and what not. He has a fantastic range. I have seen him in a variety of roles. In the film Vaaranam Aayiram, Surya plays a double role as father and son. The father grows up from a young man, falls in love, gets married and brings up his two children. The son undergoes trauma when his girlfriend dies in an accident, takes to drugs and manages to get out of it thanks to the father. Amazing roles extremely well executed. Ghajini is where he plays the role of a millionaire businessman who loses his lover to villains and his memory too in the bargain. A big feather in his cap! The son of actor Siva Kumar, Surya’s career in Tamil films has grown by leaps and bounds. The ease with which he does the role of Durai Singam makes it difficult to believe that it is but his 25th film. His dialogue delivery in this film in a dialect special to Thoothukkudi is superb. Congratulations, Surya! Keep up the good work.

Anushka Shetty as the heroine Kavya looks ugly and her dressing sense is pathetic. As regards her acting skills, she manages to scrape a pass.

Prakash Raj is a veteran and has done a wonderful job of the part of the villain just as expected. Kudos!

Vivek in the role of Yettu Erimalai was disappointing. I have seen way better performances by Vivek. The comedy sequences appear rather forced. I sincerely hope to see more quality from Vivek in future.

The rest of the cast including Radha Ravi as Durai Singam’s father, Nizhalgal Ravi as the fraudulent ACP, Vijayakumar as the Home Minister and Nassar as Kavya’s father, have done their parts well.

There were a number of fight sequences in the film that were quite violent. A few of them could have been cut down or at least reduced in length. But I see that these are greatly welcomed by the public and so cannot quite blame the director.

The computer graphics used through the film were great.
VERDICT: Most definitely worth a see. சிங்கம் வெற்றி நடை போடுகிறது!

RATING: ****Snazzy

* Silly
** Shaky
*** Smart
**** Snazzy
***** Super