The Villain Review: The Shivarajkumar-Sudeep Starrer Has Its Own Share Of Hits And Misses

The much anticipated big ticket flick of tinsel town, The Villain has hit big screens today. Starring the big wigs of the industry, Sandalwood King Shivarajkumar & Kichcha Sudeepa, the hype surrounding the movie is exemplary and the audience have been waited with bated breath to catch the show. Let’s check whether the movie stands up to the expectations of fans and audience.

On the outset, it is the battle between Rama & Raavana which poses to be a combat of good vs evil. However, a perfect conclusion can never be drawn that Raavana is an evil force as mythology doesn’t convincingly approve of the same and so does The Villain. The movie emphasizes the fact that despite Raavana being a person with a negative shade, he had his own share of positive asuspects of a good person which cannot be brushed aside. There is mother sentiment, a small hero-heroine episode and a bunch of songs which a general commercial cinema would consist of.

A typical Prem movie would consist of a mother sentiment episode and The Villain is no exception. Though in most movies, the mother-son sentiment works out well, the same seems to be on the con side in The Villain which acts as a hindrance to the movie’s pace.

Dr. Shivarajkumar has lesser screen space in the first half while he marks his stamp in the latter half. His energy, dance and performance are praiseworthy. Kichcha Sudeepa is already known as one of the finest performers of the country and The Villain stands as another testimonial to the accreditation. The combination sequences of both stars are a treat to watch for both respective fans and common audience.

Amy Jackson is there as a glam doll and doesn’t really offer a substantial output as her characterization too doesn’t allow her to flex arms. Mithun Chakravarthy adds the star attraction who looks good on-screen. Telugu actor Srikanth speaks his own dialogues and that is a treat to watch on-screen. Saranya Ponvannan is apt to her role and she earns decent brownie points.

Prem’s writing doesn’t match up to the hype and hoopla generated for the movie. When you have two giant stars sharing the screen space, you need to come up with a formidable storyline with an equivalent screen treatment. Though few sequences and heroism elevations have been worked out really well which offers a wholesome treat to Shivarajkumar and Sudeep fan base respectively, the overall momentum is not maintained throughout the movie which runs for quite a long duration. At the end of the movie, one feels that director Prem wasn’t quite able to capitalize on the great opportunity of churning out a masterpiece with two great stars.

Songs placement is another let down as a couple of songs come at a wrong time in the movie. One feels that the movie could have done better without a couple of songs.

The VFX team has played a huge part as the movie has 40% of VFX involved in it which makes it a big ticket movie automatically. But choppy output at many places doesn’t invoke excitement amongst the audience. Music by Arjun Janya is above average and not exceptional which the background music is appealing. Sound mixing and design lands on the positive side and that offers a good feel in theatres.

Rest of the technical crew have rendered good output with genuine efforts being evident on-screen.

Final Verdict

The Villain has its own good moments to offer but in total, the movie is all style and less substance.