~~~When Our Best is not good enough~~~. Review on Pazhassiraja Movie

Every nation’s freedom struggles gives birth for many heroes. Sadly, India didn’t have much of this lot to boast for. The sad fact is that we didn’t fought a war together, it were all heavily imbalanced scattered battles, which only can have one outcome. Our war heroes are those who managed to fight for few rounds, but failed to succeed. Pazhassi Raja is one such hero who helped the British to fight the mighty Tippu Sultan but only to fight with them later. It was too late for Pazhassi to identify the real enemy, who came for trade and took over the country.

The movie starts with a bang where the master script writer MT Vasudevan Nair started the narration of the leading character, the situations surrounding it, the supporting cast and the opponents. Identity of each character is set right from the beginning and situations were well created. Thrilling scenes of action added and a success to the protagonist. Till the interval, the movie was as comfortable like sitting in a fast moving car when an excellent driver is on the steers.

The second half was brilliant for all, except the protagonist, Pazhassi Raja and the leading lady Makkam. If Pazhassi was the leading man with his courage and intelligence, in the second half his character was narrated as that of a coward and a less IQ person. Have to admit that, all the sub characters (Absolutely all, including the small character created for Nedumudi) maintained their character and identity and reason. It was sad to see a king who fought so brilliantly in the first half was made mockery of the intelligence and run away like a helpless child. If he didn’t run away like a coward, then we can see him jumping to war front like Antony of Cleopatra. The king only lost three of his best men…but he failed to motivate the whole army. The weapons were all surrendered without much pressure and he repeated the mistake again by going to ‘fight’ the highly armed British with a sword, so that British could catch him easily! The king, who was a master of guerrilla war fare and a master of aiming bows, should have at least tried that way. Instead he tried to act an old day ‘Saddam Hussain’. At the end, we don’t feel sympathy for the protagonist, but to all the sub characters. We didn’t get proud of the King but of his soldiers.

MT’s script is brilliant in most case, except for the protagonist in the second half. It needed better treatment. There are logical flaws we don’t expect from a veteran. I even doubt that the second half is written by MT. Direction by Hariharan is of superb quality. All praise to him.

Mammootty as Palazzi Raja did a good job. However, he was let down by the script in the second half. The dialogues are only partly effective. The only dialogue impressed me have the meaning something like, ‘I too sharpen my love to you like I sharpen the sword’. Sharath Kumar virtually steals the show from Mammotty in the second half. He did a ‘Prabhu’ of Kalaapaani easily and got the well deserved applauds. Manoj K Jayan was superb in his role. Suresh Krishna is the surprise package of the movie. Padma Priya impress with her action filled role with best of acting and glamour (though the character is designed for the like of Vani Vishwanath, Vijayashanti or Madhavi). The leading lady Kaniha on the other hand was a let down. The sub cast did their roles well.

The music of the film is melodious and good. It could have been better, but the music director Ilayaraja missed the support of good lyrics to repeat a Kalapaani.

The film is blessed with an excellent technical crew. Let it be the brilliant cinematography by Ramanth Shetty/Venu (Those sunrays scenes…and sword fights…Wow!!), Sound recording by Rasool Pookutty, the brilliant sets, good costumes & make up, reasonably good editing…it is one technically brilliant film. The entire department worth more applauds for finishing a periodic war film for a mere 27 Crores in modern days that too after the huge set was washed away in rain and floods.

The film is a good watch and do recommend it to all. However, have to give the warning that if we are expecting a 'Vadakkan Veera Gadha' we may be disappointed heavily as the perfection in scripting and power of dialogues were missing for Pazhassi.

My rating: 3.5 stars