Film Review: MAN MADAN AMBU

Cast: Kamal Haasan, Trisha, Madhavan, Usha Uthup
Director: KS Ravi Kumar
Rating: ** Shaky

The Story: Ambu (Trisha) is a famous actress who is engaged to Madanagopal aka Madan (Madhavan). The two have known each other since childhood and are keen on getting married. But things change when Madan visits her on the sets of a film. Ambu is dancing with Actor Surya when Madan and his parents land there. While his mother (Usha Uthup) keeps pointing out that Ambu’s character may not be clean, Madan goes a bit crazy with his suspicious nature. The two of them quarrel on their way back from Kodaikanal and are the cause of an accident. But not seeing the car they had hit, the two go on. Ambu insists that they wait for three years before getting married.

At the tail end of the three years, she goes on a trip to Europe along with her divorced friend and her two kids. Major Mannar (Kamal Hassan) is setting up a detective firm and Madan hires him to follow Ambu. Madan hopes to catch his fiancée red-handed during a love affair. While Mannar is unable to find anything against her, he is forced to lie to Madan as the latter refuses to pay him otherwise. And the major needs the money urgently for his best friend’s cancer treatment.

Watch the film to see where it goes from here and whether Madan and Ambu get together in the end.

My Perception: The film started off superbly and I totally enjoyed the first half. Surya was as handsome as ever in the dance sequence with Trisha and of course she also looked great.

Trisha is a good actress and she has really excelled herself in the role of Ambu. By the way, the film title is about the three main characters. Man Madan Ambu – Mannar, Madhanagopal & Ambujakshi, as well as Cupid’s Arrow.

Maddy is a way better actor than what he has delivered in this film. He has put on oodles of weight and maybe suits the drunkard he is playing. The negative role was going well until suddenly he agrees to get together with Ambu’s married friend. Too tough to swallow!

Mannar and Ambu’s relationship was building well, till the point they tell each other the truth. The next scene they are in love. How can that happen? Either something is wrong with the director, or the editor has swung his scissors too far or maybe the film crew were keen that the audience use their imagination in-between and fill in the gaps.

I like a film with a happy ending, with all ends tied up – yes!

But this was just ridiculous. Just before the last 20 minutes, there were problems galore. But the final bit of the film, everything falls in place with no rhyme or reason – as if the pieces of the jigsaw fell together all-wrong.

Usha Uthup’s evil expression looked just great. But what was with her role? She was doing her best to break her son’s relationship with his actor fiancée. That was for a few scenes. She was written off somewhere midway.

The actress playing Trisha’s friend was a natural. But towards the end, even her part was bungled by the filmmakers.

Kamal Hassan did his part well, except for that goof-up in presuming that the audience understood that he and Trisha were in love.

I expected way more from director Ravi Kumar with such wonderful hits in his kitty. The first half appeared to be his film. He probably gave the second half to be directed by some newcomer while he took off on a holiday (tongue-in-cheek).

Verdict: An absolutely disappointing film.

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