Raavan (Movie Review - 2010)

Raavan - Ramayana Revisited



Release Date - June 18, 2010



First we had Raajneeti, which was based on epic Mahabharta and now we have Raavan, which has highlights of epic Ramayana. But does Mani Ratanam presents the modern day epic succesfully as Prakash Jha did with Raajneeti? Well, Yes, but to some extent.



One can easily relate the characters of Ramayana with this movie. To begin with we have SP Dev (played by Vikram) and Ragini (played by Aishwarya) as a happily married couple. They are like Ram-Sita of Ramayana. Then we have Nikhil Dwivedi who plays subordinate to Dev, much like Lakshman. Now, the main character, the Raavana, played by Abhishek as Beera.



The story line is simple and well lift from the epic itself. Beera kidnaps Ragini to take revenge on Dev for the wrong the police department have done with Beera's sister. Dev takes the help of Sanjeevani (played by Govinda) to find Beera. So, Sanjeevani is our Hanuman here. What follows is the grand cinematography by Sivan and Manikandan. The underwater scenes, the forest captures and shots of Aish falling from the cliff and dangling on a treeare just brilliant.



But where Ratnam misses the plot is unnecessary songs and aweful back ground score. The movie also reminds of Naxals and Maoists. The reason behind Beera abducting Ragini is also not well told. Beera kills Policemen brutally, burn them alive, for a reason which is not strong enough. Then over dependence on Ramayana, made movie look predictable. Sanjeevani's meeting with Ragini was exact copy of how Hanuman sat on the tree and dropped Ram's ring towards Sita.



Coming to the performances : -



1. Abhishek Bachchan : - Abhishek as Beera has done well. Somehow he always perform well with Mani Ratnam. But he was far better in Guru and Yuva.



2. Aishwarya Rai Bachchan : - Aish steals the show. Hats off to her for her performance for which she would have gone through physical hell.



3. Vikram: - Vikram acts well, but is overshadowed by larger then life performance of Abhi-Ash.



4. Govinda : - I want to ask a question to Mani. Why GOVINDA???? He could have taken any actor for that role.



On the whole, the movie lacks orginality. The movie lacks good script and the movie lacks good background score. What scores for Raavana is the cinematography. Just like Bose did it for Kites by taking beautiful viusals of Mexico and Vegas, Sivan and Mani have done for Raavan with enthralling visuals from Forests. Music by A R Rehman is a let down. There is only one good song - Behne de.



Still, Raavan can be watched one time for Aish's performance, Abhishek's potray of evil Raavan and brilliant camera work. But this obviously is not the best of Mani Ratnam.



Rating : - 3 out of 5 stars