Enthiran Movie Review

I watched the most anticipated movie of 2010 - Enthiran - at one of the local theatres at Chennai. It was "Rakesh Theatre" an annexe of "Vetri Theatre", Chrompet and the show was at 8 AM! I watched the movie with a couple of my friends from work.

In a nutshell, this movie mainly deals with the conflicts that arise in an Android robot created by a scientist, when he programs the robot to start experiencing human emotions.

That one-liner by itself is something that the Tamil movie industry has not dealt with ever. For that matter, I really cannot think of a Tamil movie that has actually brought science to the forefront, except for the classic variations of mental illnesses like amnesia, schizophrenia etc. The best attempt in dealing with science was perhaps Dasavatharam and that was a movie made only to deal with megalomaniacal needs of one actor, not necessarily to talk about the impact of biological warfare.

Enthiran, on the other hand, deals with Robotics and features Rajni as a scientist who creates an Android (that looks exactly like him), with the aim of introducing such Androids into the Indian Army and save valuable human life. And before he approaches the agency that can certify that the robot is fit enough to be presented to the Armed Forces, he decides to loan it to Aish, his girlfriend, to see how he reacts to the World. And after a few funny sequences and some stupid stunt sequences (they looked better on You Tube), the scientist makes the necessary tweaks and presents it to the agency.

The Board in-charge of granting this permission is headed by Rajni's old professor, Danny Dengzongpa, who is at some level jealous of Rajni and so, ensures that Rajni's robot (named Chitti) does not get the necessary approvals for mass production. The official reasoning given is that, the robot would only follow orders and would not evaluate the emotional aspect of its actions.

So Rajni, starts programming robot to start understanding emotions and lo behold, even the robot realises that Aishwarya Rai (scientist Rajni's girl-friend) is quite attractive. And starts developing feelings of love and affection towards her. That is really where the story starts.

Scientist Rajni again presents the robot to few Army Generals, but the robot starts reciting verses of love. An enraged Rajni then destroys the robot, but the evil Danny goes in search of it in the city's dump yard and restores "life" back to it. Additionally, he gives the robot some negative shades and sets him lose.

Since the robot is now strongly attracted to Aish and has also been given negative traits by Danny, he goes on a mission to abduct Aish and marry her. Along the way, he also manages to create multiple robots like himself and also kills Danny. After kidnapping Aish, there is a rather elaborate sequence where scores of Policemen get killed by the bad robot.

The robot then houses Aish somewhere and tries to convince her to marry him. Scientist Rajni then joins the legions of the robots and tries to sabotage the main bad robot's plans. After a lot of gun-fights, good triumphs over evil and all is settled. The bad robot becomes good again, but the Judiciary orders that it be dismantled. After a poignant speech by the robot, it is laid to rest.

Parts of the story may evoke strong similarities to many Hollywood movies, primarily to Bicentennial Man (which incidentally was released 10 years ago and that is the same 10 years ago that Director Shankar claims to have conceived this movie)!

Now that story narration is done, here are my observations about the movie, covering both the good and the bad, in no specific order:

- Fundamentally, this is not your typical Rajni movie. If you want a Sivaji or a Padaiyappa or even a Chandramukhi type of movie - don't watch Enthiran.
- While it is not a Rajni movie, it is not a proper science fiction either. There are way too many loose ends with the Android and I cannot accept that the robot can be simply programmed to learn emotions in just a couple of weeks.
- The special effects in the movie are good. Then again, it is not at current Hollywood levels for sure. I think the blame for it should not go to technology, but more to the ideation process.
- Rajni the villain is just amazing. We badly need to see him again in a strong negative role. The "black sheep" scene was just awesome.
- Rajni has also completely under-played himself in the role of the scientist. Absolutely no mannerisms, catch-phrases etc.
- Aishwarya Rai looks stunning. And she dances really well, especially in the "Boom Boom Robot da" song.
- The music was quite good and the songs were well picturised. The "Kaadhal Anukkall" song has been shot in an amazing location - some desert that has a stream of water in the middle. Rajni and Aish are the only ones on screen and they are wearing clothes that blend with the location. On the contrary, in the "Kilimanjaro" song, there are way too many group dancers and the costumes are also quite loud. The song has been shot in Machu Picchu, Peru. I felt that the whole loudness of the song and costumes, did not allow the viewer to enjoy the beauty of Machu Picchu.
- The robot is supposed to get charged by using just 2 units of power (1 unit = 1000 Watts per hour). But when the bad robots are all near empty on energy, they simply plug into the batteries of various cars and get full power before you can say WTF. Similarly, in an earlier sequence, the robot charges itself by connecting to a high-tension current from a transformer box.
- The scene that has been setup to prove that while a robot can do amazing things (like rescuing people caught in fire), it cannot react to the emotional needs of people (one of the people caught in the fire is a girl who was having her bath and is hence nude and shouldn't have been brought in public in the same nude state).
- The scene with the robot talking to a mosquito - idiotic.
- Most of the songs have been squeezed into the second-half and sadly, the drag was felt.
- The epilogue of the movie was quite interesting, with a couple of good dialogues. There was an earlier instance too - when the main characters talk about why it is impossible for a machine and human to be married. This scene did not carry the necessary bite and fell flat, primarily due to very bland dialogues.
- The robot's initial interaction with the real world was quite good. Quite a lot of humor was thrown in and they did evoke quite a few guffaws.

In the overall level, I would only give it a 2.5/5. Yes, from now on, my movie reviews are going to get rated.


P.S.: A quick note on the theatre, since I have a feeling that it may have affected my perception of the movie. It was 25 rows long and just wide enough to seat 14 people with a narrow aisle in the middle. The screen was from wall to wall, so you can imagine what a telescopic vision I had of the screen. The fans on the side were actually blocking the end of the screen!
When the first "romantic" scene between Rajni and Aish came up, someone in the audience shouted "Thalaiva, Khabardar", in reference to the speech that Rajni made during the audio launch.
At the very end of the movie, a bunch of school children are shown walking around a museum where the dismantled robot is kept and one of the girls (featured in too many ads and has acted in the movie Sillunu Oru Kaadhal) talks to the robot. The same voice in the audience now yelled "Thalaivaroda adutha pada heroine ready"!