Payanam - Movie review

I consider Radhamohan as Rajkumar Hirani of the south. As Prakashraj describes very often, Radha looks at the world through a different lens. He has a very subtle and simple way of dealing even emotional and sensitive subjects. Who could forget Mozhi ? He takes the same approach to this hijack subject. But the re is a bit of overdose of humor in payanam that you wonder whats happened to the main story.

As usual the dialogues make you roll on the floor laughing. The passengers are seated as pairs of opposite poles - an atheist and an astrologer, an upcoming movie star and his fan and so on. These present situations for a laugh riot and Radha doesn't miss a beat. The director - actor combo that appear post interval takes the cake off the others for sure. The film also has some emotional points thrown here and there, which makes you feel sorry even for the terrorists. Kudos to Prakashraj for producing a neat and decent movie yet again !

Nagarjuna's underplay and heroism would be the crowd puller for the Telugu version. Prakashraj, M.S. Baskar, Manobala, Brahmanandham, Thalaivaasal Vijay and the other support cast fit like T to their roles.  The special effects department and the set direction could have been better. You could spot  pathetic glitches in these in some frames. A Frontech headphones for the cockpit?? This movies has no songs, but the background score is good. Lighting and camera must have been easy since there were only a few locations.

The film takes off with a great promise and sails the smooth skies till the hijackers take over the plane. (Don't worry about spoilers in this review, there aren't any, because there is no suspense in the movie anyway) Radha has told in his interviews that he wanted to present hijack through the eyes of the passengers, news reporters, terrorists and the commandos. But I'm afraid the  different views shown  here are far from anything real. There was a huge lack of background research. The single emotion  - fear - that  must dominate  the  victims and hence the audience was missing. You have bits and pieces of all emotions.

We are a nation who are "used" to so many forms of terrorist acts and so would expect something more gripping than a laugh riot in a subject like this.

Yuththam Sei - movie review

Mysskin, always insists that he is only a writer and is yet to graduate to a movie director. Well, you do  get a feeling of reading a tamil crime novel (read Rajeshkumar, Subha etc )when you watch his latest flick Yuththam sei. A couple of departments that lift the drama from that level to a celluloid movie are the camera and background score. Only problem here is what works at a crime novel level may not work as a movie. There are more loose ends to tighten in the latter. 

Mysskin joins the now growing bunch of directors ( Gautam Menon, Sasikumar) whose latest offerings depict the horrible crimes against young women. (I'm scared of this becoming the next trend in Tamil cinema after movies based on Madurai, 3m). But I'm sure this would be the one that has tried to limit obscenity as less as possible (Nadunisi naigal is yet to release). As in any typical Mysskin movie there are many strange angled shots, legs of the actors get more importance than their faces, slow panned shots to reveal carton boxes etc. I have to admit these techniques have worked well for this genre than a Nandhalaala. The first thing that hits you about the movie is the background score for sure. Kudos to the new kid around the block K

The reason this movie did not work for me is the fact that there are too many clues and characters that I gave up trying to solve the mystery in an hour. Also, the string connecting these clues - the protagonist CBI officer - is too confused and weak to concentrate on solving the plot for us to follow. The truth that unfolds later in the second half is neither believable or interesting enough. Finally, there are too many unanswered questions which end up as loop holes in the plot when you regurgitate the movie in your mind on the way back home. 

Cheran has done his best to underplay as the disturbed CBI officer. I have no idea why he needs the 2 assistants ( Dipa Shah and the other guy) Chelva has comeback to mainstream cinema with this movie. Jayaprakash, YG Mahendra steal the show. Again, I don't know what would difference it would make to the movie if Yugendran and a couple of guys in his gang are not there. Mysskin has to seriously change the way he visualises action scenes in his movies. Even though dramatic at the moment, the fights are repetitive, boring and not practically believable. Needless to say, Kannitheevu ponna is already a chart buster, but this is exactly where he looses his grip on the audience and everything that follows becomes predictable.

I did like the director's satire in a couple of scenes like - a cop stealing a watermelon. There was little emphasize on the explanation for the title Yuththam sei- which means 'wage a war'. A very few of the audience might wait till the last scene in the beach where Cheran talks to the boy over the phone about purpose of his parent's and his war.

Yeah, for once I do agree with Mysskin's on his ability as a director - this might have worked for me as a novel than a movie

Who should be your Beta customer?

Here are a few pointers to choose ( yes you have all the right to ! ) your Beta customers of your product.

1. Beta users are your very first customers, but need not necessarily be your best friends or relatives or even your investors. Your close pal would obviously be very happy and proud to tell the world about your achievement of making an idea into a product, but that might not be just enough to take it to the next level. Carefully select a few among your target users.

2. So now you know that the beta user should be from the relevant target industry. But make sure that he is also somebody who actually needs your product. You might have evaluated your idea at concept stage with industry veterans, but on all probability they might be too big to need your product. Choose somebody who actually has the problem you are trying to solve. Mentors might give you a whole lot of ideas and direction but in the end say that they don't need you !

3. Stay away from people who turned you down in during your initial market research. They might have turned away because either they felt your product is not viable or they might be using an existing alternative (read competitor !). In all right, you would want to prove they are wrong and how your product is better. STOP right there, understand this is not the time for it. The purpose of beta testing is to refine your product, don't get carried away at this stage.

4.  Understand the difference between marketing and beta testing. This is no time to increase user base and market your baby, simply because it is still a baby. Get a small but trusted number of users, respect and respond to them.

5. Make sure your beta users have the time to not only use the product but also to give valuable feedback about it. There are loads of survey methods and software tools to capture user feedback. Give incentives to attract beta users to provide feedback. Take it, refine and fine tune your product.