RAAVAN Review

TWO in RaaONE Review: Mani Ratnams character has WON my heart - RAAWON!
Please Read this review carefully and then make your decision and comment.
In the beginning of the film the disclaimer comes as usual : This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance of characters to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Now let me get to the film. Mani Ratnam has infact not credited the story to anyone in the titles but has had his name in screenplay. Note that! The story rights of the film is with Valmiki :)

The epic Ramayan's plot - 14 years of Vanvaas is retold here with 14 days of Ragini's RaaVanvas. She is been kidnapped by Beera and tied all the time like a dog, cow and a goat. Welcome to Water Kingdom - as the entire film is shot in waters. Its raining (drizzling) throughout the film and so we have actors without the make up. Mujhe Behne de Mujhe Behne de..... Rahmans music flows along!

The posters say Is there a Ram inside Raavan? Very true, Ratnam brings this out in the film and one can always fall in love with this evil character as he is a heart of gold. But, its time to actually hate the goody Ram who is not a good hearted man as Valmiki described in his book. This Ram (Dev) shoots at innocent and is a coward too. While, Raavan (Beera) is a evil with a heart of gold. Sita (Ragini) actually finds sympathy towards the evil. If Sita had to go through the Agni Pareeksha to prove her innocence, here Raagini is asked by her beau to do a Polygraph test to prove her virginity. And Ragini is todays woman. So, you cant expect her to sacrifice, Instead.... watch the film as the climax is the best part of the entire film, which is open to the audience to actually think about and to debate about.
Come to Reality with this Reelity film - Valmikis version has been followed since ages, Ratnams version is more real in today's corporate world.
More so, Shurpanaka's character is on a positive side while Lakshman is shown to be a rapist. Who 'Nose' the truth, he actually chopped her nose or he played with it.
In the film, Hanuman (Sanjeevini) is shown jumping from tree to tree before you say One two tree - as poor Govinda did not get a chance to sing and dance, he acts like the Monkey in the Jungle. Also, from nowhere reaches the den of Beera to meet Ragini (The plot of Hanuman searching Sita, but unfortunately he does not lit the fire in the camp). So, let me lit that fire here - Is Ram Sena listening and watching this film? As Ratnam's film actually shows - the Evil to be Good Spirit and the Goody to be Devil. Inside Ram is Raavan and Raavan has Ram in him.

Coming to the film - I watched both the versions. Tamil and Hindi. And let me add here even though the scenes and the characters are the same, the way it is portrayed on screen makes a lot of difference.
And truly speaking performance wise, Prithviraj is good as the Hero in the Tamil version. This is definately not Aishwarya's best work till date. Govinda and Karthik (playing Hanuman) is good to be mocked for their character. Bhojpuriya Ravi Kissen can get claps from his Bhojpuri fans, while Shivaji Prabhu enacting the same in Tamil version does not impress. Priyamani for Tamil is a plus point but does not find any sympathy for her character in the same role in the Hindi version. Nikhill Dwivedi (playing Lakshman - not the brother here)'s nude scene is applaud worthy. That brings us to the Nation's Villain in Hindi version - Abhishek Bachchan - He is good as the character Raavan. Performance wise, Terrifying, Psychic and Innocence - Abhi deserves to be nominated for the character. Vikram fails in his Hindi debute as the Hero, but he is excellent in the title role in Tamil. And to compare between the two Raavan's its Vikram who wins over Abhishek Bachchan as RaaWON (only the character).

Getting back to Mani Ratnam's film - I sometime wondered if this was a Ram Gopal Varma film, as the way it is shot reminded only of a RGV film. And if Ram Gopal Varma made his Aag, this is Mani Ratnam's Paani. RGV made the Famous Villain of all time (Gabbar) redo with Big B and Mani has tried the Famous Villain of All era (Raavan) try out with the Chota Bachchan, unfortunately - the film does not have a single dialogue that refers to him/or says that his name is RAAVAN.

And about the verdict of the film - I said, I loved the character of Raavan as the Evil has WON my heart and not the film. The film fails miserably and my friend who was watching the film slept for most of the time in the hall as he found it boring - I had to tell him wake up KUMBAKARAN, you have come to watch RAAVAN

Sundeep Malani
Film Critic