Ayogya movie review: With Ayogya, Vishal takes a step further and unleashes his ‘mass’ avatar at the audience.Ayogya movie cast: Vishal, Raashi Khanna, Parthiepan
Ayogya movie director: Venkat Mohan
Ayogya movie rating: 2.5 stars
Temper (2015) worked for the Telugu audience because the script was tailor-made for Junior NTR. I am sure the actor-choreographer wouldn’t have done anything particularly extra for the sake of cinema as his role was similar to his real-life persona. But in the Tamil remake, Vishal fails to ride on Junior NTR’s energetic performance. The story revolves around a bad cop, Karnan (Vishal) and how he turns good in the final moments.
In Tamil cinema, emotions and sentiments come first. Then, follows the logic, or whatever. If you are someone who looks for ‘logic’ in commercial cinema, Ayogya may not work. Otherwise, it is an average crowd-pleaser. The film, of course, has its moments. I am not saying those are never-seen-before sorts, but Venkat Mohan has given them a different colour and flavour.
The premise isn’t bad at all. As the title suggests, Karnan is a fraud. He is temperamental and eccentric. Also, he is a rogue cop who has zero morality. In Tamil cinema, ‘the hero’, that too a cop, can’t do ‘unacceptable’ things. You know he will change. He should. But the transformation takes time. So much time. Abdul Kader, a Sub-Inspector, doesn’t salute Karnan because he has greased his palms. As the audience, we know that-salute-will-come-someday.
Vishal seems to be having the most fun playing such a character. In the beginning, we are shown why he thinks money is everything. But you keep thinking Ayogya would have been a better film if it had some other hero. In a lot of places, Vishal oversells his performance and tries to be someone that he is not.
With Ayogya, Vishal takes a step further and unleashes his ‘mass’ avatar at the audience. You can hear the makers play a MGR song each time he is shown on the frame. And one of the characters casually says, “Ungalukku arasiyal-a vararthukku naraiya thagudhi iruku.”
Ayogya gives us a couple of engaging good lines when Parthiepan’s character meets Vishal’s, but a few good lines aren’t simply enough. Vishal gets a mass-y interval scene but that is the problem with these commercial potboilers. There is a loud Vishal, ‘the hero’, but the film doesn’t equally have a loud villain. In the original, Prakash Raj was pitted against Junior NTR, and their portions were much effective. I don’t know why Prakash Raj wasn’t roped in for Ayogya. Maybe, he is fed up of getting stereotyped, but the actor-politician’s performance is quite hard to reprise.
I don’t understand why ‘rapes’ become inevitable in these ‘mass’ films. And the irony is, the makers have chosen Radha Ravi to play a judge, who has a say in the cruelty-against-women case.
Ayogya would have worked if the makers had put in more thought on why they were remaking the earlier film in the first place. If that had happened, the film wouldn’t have a needless item number and don’t ask me if item numbers are ever needful. Sigh.
Hey, you know what? Simbu was the original choice for the lead role, it seems. Okay, never mind.
