Star Cast of Raavan: Abhishek Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Vikram Kennedy, Govinda, Manisha Koirala, Nikhil Dwivedi, Ravi Kishan, Tejaswini Kolhapure, Priyamani, Bipasha Basu in a special appearance.
Two weeks after Bollywood served its audience the modern day version of Mahabharata in Raajneeti; it’s now the turn of treating them with the modern day version of modern day version of Ramyana in Raavan.
There were huge expectations from this film directed by Mani Ratnam, which depicts the tale of a modern day cop Dev (Vikram) or Lord Ram, his loving wife Ragini (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan)or Goddess Sita, a forest officer Sanjeevni (Govinda), who knows the entire jungle very well or Hanuman, the cop’s close aide [Nikhil Dwivedi] or Laxman, the sister of the rival [Priyamani] or Surpanakha and Beera (Abhishek Bachchan) the man, who kidnaps the Dev’s wife or Ravana.
Raavana, which has a close resemblance to the year 2000 release Jungle, does not end with Ram killing the vicious Ravana but goes a step further and shows the cop accusing his wife about her character after she stayed in the custody of rival, just as Lord Ram had questioned Sita and asked her to leave his kingdom. But, the director has in a very unorthodox and unpredictable way used the whole concept Ram asking Sita to prove her purity, to catch the evil man in the film and end it.
This is a story of a cop and a dancer, who after falling in love get married. The cop then has to move to a posting in Lal Maati, a small town in northern India, where people either out of love or scare have more faith in the local tribal man, who is the rival of police and believes in passing power to have-not.
Whereas Dev wants to change this fear factor that this tribal man Beera has created around ordinary poor people and help them have a better life, Beera has no faith in police and wants to strike hard against them. And to do so, he kidnaps Dev’s wife Ragini. Dev then sets out in search of his wife and to fight the evil of Beera. Needless to say, in this fight between good and evil, good ultimately wins and is proved superior.
The film, starts with Ragini being kidnapped by Beera and Dev setting out to search her. The first hour of the film is very slow, where you as a viewer keep waiting for something to happen.
In fact, probably what Mani Ratnam thought was the biggest highlight of the film has proved to be the biggest drawback for it. For about one hour, you keep wondering why Beera is being so cruel to Ragini and understand nothing in this confusion. The flashback in the film, where Dev attacks Beera’s house and takes his sister into custody to torture her, comes rather late in the film. The film only picks-up in the second hour only once the flashback is over.
Another failure of Raavan is that it fails to establish Beera’s character properly and show his might and power. The need of the film was to show Beera as a powerful man, who can give a tough time to anyone including the police and government machinery but it does not do so in any way.
The climax of the film is equally unconvincing. You fail to understand why doesn’t Abhishek try to kill both Vikram and Aishwarya when he could have easily done so? Again, the film should have ended with Vikram rescuing Aishwarya and Abhishek escaping from the scene. Aishwarya coming back and showing her love to Abhishek and then Vikram cornering him to kill him is rather unconvincing. The entire scene of Vikram accusing Aishwarya about her character to establish the sequence of Ram abandoning Sita also looks out of context.
But the film has good portions also. The scene of Abhishek abducting Aishwarya has been shot well. The same goes for the flashback portion of the film, which goes a long way to take the story forward.
The film is very strong technically. Shyam Kaushal, and Peter Hein have really worked hard on the action scenes making some of the action sequences in the film a treat to watch. The film has been shot well by Santosh Sivan and V. Manikandan. The choreography and dialogue f the film are also good. But, the biggest highlight of the film is its music. The team of A R Rehman and Mani Ratnam, which has always given an excellent music scores, have once again come-up with great musical numbers.
Though it may not be his best work but Mani Ratnam has also showcased his capabilities as a director with this film.
The three leading actors of the film Abhishek Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and Vikram have done justice to their respective roles. They have been supported well by Nikhil Dwivedi, Ravi Kishan and Priyamani. As it was predicted, Govinda’s role is too small and you are left wondering as to why the director did not give him a few more scenes at the climax.
No, Raavan is not a bad film. The film may not be the best work of Mani Ratnam, who has given many thought provoking films in the past, but still Raavana is a good piece of cinema that you as a viewer will enjoy. But, you certainly expected more from the genius named Mani Ratnam. The worst part is that Mani Ratnam, who has always worked very hard of scripts and screenplay has faltered precisely at that point, this time around.
