Mohanlal's Lokpal - Exclusive Movie Review

Lokpal Malayalam Movie Review

Directed by     Joshiy
Produced by     Ruby Vijayan
S. L. Vimal Kumar
Written by     S. N. Swamy

Starring    
  
    Mohanlal as Nandagopal / Lokpal
    Kavya Madhavan as Geetha
    Meera Nandan as Jain
    Thambi Ramaiah
    Manoj K. Jayan
    Shafna
    Thalaivasal Vijay
    Saikumar
    Krishna Kumar
    T. G. Ravi
    Maniyanpilla Raju
    Sivaji Guruvayoor
    Shammy Thilakan
    Pradeep


Music by     Ratheesh Vegha
Cinematography     Pradeep Nair
Editing by     Syam Sasidharan
Studio     Happy & Ruby Cinemas
Distributed by     Aashirvad Release through Maaxlab
Release date(s)    

    January 31, 2013

Running time     140 min
Country     India
Language     Malayalam

Expectation

22 years after blockbuster 'Naduvazhikal the hit trio of Mohanlal-Joshiy-S.N.swami reunites in this film. The last film of Lal-Joshiy combo, Run Babby Run, was also a blockbuster. The different getups have raised expectations of fans sky high. But since the writer S.N.Swami was having a rough patch for the past few years the hype didn't go overboard.

Story

Lokpal is an Family-Crime-Drama-Thriller from Master writer of suspense S.N Swami

 Nandagopal (Mohanlal) who runs a restaurant by day, is also an undercover social activist. He is a on a mission to fight and eliminate corruption from the state. The different methods, get ups, looks that Nandan portrays to get to his aim, his past, tiff with the Police etc forms the rest of the story.

The 2 heroines in the movie, Meera Nandan, plays an investigative Journalist & Kavya Madhavan, plays a Doctor.

Evaluation

Lokpal is yet another half-baked script by S.N.Swami, who is just trying to survive in this industry some way somehow.  For that he used and damaged the reputation of the hit combo of Joshiy and Mohanlal.

The basic plot is inspired from Ramana, Anniyan, 4 the people etc. All these films were huge hits in Kerala too, so while going with such a story line the script should have been that much interesting, entertaining, racy with full of twists and turns. Instead it turns out to be damp squib. I have absolutely no Idea why either of Joshiy or Lal even agreed to do this project (may be because it deals with a current, socially relevant topic, just like Karmayodha). 

First half of the movie was average, while the second half was even worse coz nothing much was happening in the film. In the climax writer added few twists and turns, but it was too late by then.

The film has just one song which is not even worthy of mentioning, the BG/RR also offers nothing unique. Camera was good, especially the overhead HELI shots of Kochi city, were Good and seen in a Mollywood film for the first time I think.

Mohanlal looked uninterested and was sleep walking for most of the parts. His role was horribly written and the 7 getups failed to evoke any kind of response even from the fans (except the TTE getup).

Kavya Madhavan had a cameo length role and even In that short period she managed to get some boos from crowd. Meera Nandan did an okay job eventhough her role too was nothing to boast about.

Joshiy the director had a major role in making Run Babby Run a blockbuster, but here even he too was helpless.

Sai Kumar got a villain role with difference and he did an excellent job. Rest of the cast like T.G.Ravi, Krishna Kumar, Shammi Thilakan, Thambi Ramaiah [Dubbed by Marimayam fame Manikandan Pattambi] was OK.

Being a Mohanlal fan the movie is colossal disappointment.

For others it may be average or below

Rating 2/5

Box Office – Flop

NB: still perplexed by the decision of makers to release the film on a Thursday especially when a public holiday doesn’t fall on the first 2/3 days.