Vishu is here and you have 2 movies releasing, one each from both the superstars of Mollywood. Had a day off today, and we had both the movies releasing here in Chennai – Chinatown and Doubles. I was pretty much in a serious confusion as to which one to go for. Went ahead for Chinatown coz it was coming from the stable of Rafi Mecartin who had given the Malayalam industry some good movies like Punjabi House, Thenkasipattanam, Hello etc., But yes I guess records are pretty much like cricket statistics, you might have 20 centuries to your name, but eventually if you are out of form, nothing can save you. And it seems like that’s the story with Rafi Mecartin with their last outing Love in Singapore with Mammooty being a disappointment, and they seem to have missed the bus once again.
20 minutes into the movie, I realize that I have made a big mistake and now with theatres making you cram and park your vehicles, I had no option to even leave the movie midway, so there I was looking forward to spend 150 long mins in the theatre.
Chinatown has been set in Goa (how much ever you try and make Ramoji Film City look like Goa, it jus doesn’t work), the only place in India where gambling is legal. The story talks about two generations, and of three sons of three illustrious fathers meeting after twenty years. Enter Mathukutty (Mohanlal), Zachariah (Jayaram) and Binoy (Dileep) – three long lost friends who are forced to come back together as one of their uncles (Capt. Raju) suddenly popped up from somewhere with loads of money and a casino which he intends to hand it over to our heroes. So how they come together and get caught in a web of some 101 characters who are supposedly forced into the script (read Jagathy Sreekumar and that Hungarian Sumo Wrestler). Ohh and in between all this there is the villain (Pradeep Rawat aka Ghajini), who was the one who destroyed their childhood and separated the three friends. There is a whole Hangover type of situation that was created to bring in some laughs, but for me it ended up being another drag of 15 mins to a very dragging and boring climax. Normally you walk out of a theatre after a bad movie and you still remember 1-2 scenes that are memorable. Unfortunately for me, now such luck for me in this movie. There were some scenes that were absolutely made in bad taste and the ones that stands out for me is the one in the dhyana kendram and the whole nonsense about Dileep’s love failures. Suraj Venjaramoodu is someone I thought would be a saving grace, but here too his role is just to add to the confusion and shout out his dialogues. It’s as if shouting is the new comedy. The three heroines played by Kavya Madhavan, Poonam Bajwa and Dipasha are not even there in the movie for the glamour content, which makes me wonder why couldn’t the director and producer avoid having them and saving some money, but then if I think deep, I would wonder why couldn’t the producer director not make the movie at all and save all the money spent. Looking back at my review, I feel I have gone overboard with the negativity, maybe yes a few people in the theatre do enjoy such movies, unfortunately for me, I don’t fall into that group. Eod it just makes me wonder, do filmmakers really think majority of the audiences don’t have any taste? Come on guys, give us quality cinema like a Pranchiyettan or an Arabikatha and we will embrace you!
As I complete this review, I get a sms from a friend who went for Doubles and he writes “You must be lucky that you went for Chinatown as Doubles was pathetic” oh GOD, little does he know how lucky I was to have seen Chinatown.
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