

A teensy-weensy pat on the back for Milind and me for a line of conflict in K2K that unfolds here as well, in practically the same form.Very happy, very relieved to be proved wrong on this count, even there are reminders of all those earlier films, especially the latter. At some point, I feared this was going to be another holy-fool outing for Kamal, after Mumbai XPress, Virumandi and the destiny-driven Anbe Sivam.Looking at Suriya here, I’m trying to remember if there has been another film where a guest star, a huge hero in his own right, has been allowed to walk away with whistles before the actual hero makes his appearance.Oh, but did he have to make his entry with a one-against-many fight? But the sequence does have a worthwhile payoff, proof – if it were at all needed – that Kamal worships the ground beneath Peter Sellers’s feet: The throwaway sight gag at the end where he, with exquisite ease, sets upright a fallen dustbin.After they are swallowed up by the black hole of time, there won’t be any more eye-blinding superstars – only momentary meteors, over and done with in the blink of an eye. After all these years, why does it still bring a smile to the lips when the theatre erupts in whistles and claps and screams upon the first sighting of our foremost actor? I think it’s part of our DNA – regardless of the quality of the final product, we are programmed to respond affectionately to Kamal and Rajini.But can you just shut up and shove aside those petulant resentments and watch this film for what it is? Please? Thank you very much.”

