Actor Vishal's latest film Ayogya continues to bother you several minutes after leaving the theatre. But this is mostly because your ears are still ringing after yet another cop film, where the protagonist would rather shout the dialogues than say them. One movie-watcher was even seen rubbing his ears in a distressed manner, claiming that the hero here had surpassed Suriya from Singam 3, in this competition of vocal prowess.
As the film's name suggests, the protagonist Karnan, played by Vishal, is most definitely an Ayogyan (fraud). How do I know this? Well, director Venkat Mohan has spent close to two and half hours to drive home the point, only to slide back into the predictable avatar for a Tamil cop. The movie was first made in Telugu as Temper, starring Junior NTR. And while it addresses the issue of sexual violence, the screenplay tires you out before you reach the final message .
Vishal plays an inspector who rose into the police ranks through fraud and whose only intention is to make money. His ambition helps him earn the friendship of Chennai goon Kalirajan played by veteran actor Parthiban. Together, they plunder, loot and destroy people's lives. All is well in our anti-hero's life, except for the honest and annoying subordinate Abdul Khadar (KS Ravikumar) who neither salutes the inspector nor does any good by himself. The least he could have done is warn the anti-corruption bureau. But obviously, honest people in this film are also quite stupid.
Another stunning example of this is, of course, the female lead played by Raashi Khanna, who while supposedly playing a pivotal role in the protagonist's character development, somehow fails to notice that he is a bad guy. In one scene, he gatecrashes her house demanding to know why she is standing close to another man. And instead of getting alarmed by his behaviour, she promptly falls in love with this certified stalker cop.
As a villain, Kalirajan is disappointing. Parthiban is reduced to a joke most of the time, with Vishal probably wreaking more damage in the 'being evil' department than he does. And while this premise sounds interesting, poor writing and dialogues force our tolerance levels to plummet before the much needed interval.
For example, one of Vishal's most repeated punch dialogues in the film is - My ego is like Wifi, it surrounds me.
Even the villain is stumped by the conviction with which the cop delivers this terrible piece of writing. This is then followed by a series of tropes necessary to explain any action by a Tamil hero - mother sentiment, father sentiment, sister sentiment and wait for it -- Gandhi sentiment. Yes, you read that right. Even the Father of the Nation is not spared.
And just when you think the screenplay is finally picking up, as it moves on to speaking of justice in cases of sexual violence, you realise that the director has cast popular potty-mouth Radha Ravi as a High Court judge who sits in on the case. But if you can get past that shocker, the movie finally delivers with a completely unexpected climax. Totally unreal, yes, and a solution that activists on ground have been critiquing for years, but interesting cinematic twist nevertheless.
But the real question is, do you have the strength to face the rest of it for the last 15 minutes?