A KV Anand movie never fails to catch my attention every time. Thus it was natural for me to be excited to watch Kavan in cinema on it is opening weekend. Coming back after 2 year gap, my expectations on KV Anand was indeed high especially after knowing that he has team up with Vijay Sethupathi, who is one of the best actors in town. Despite the fact the film has T.Rajendar (TR) in it I still choose to see the film on its opening weekend
Story Review
When I first watch the trailer, the first impression that was formed is that Kavan looks more like an extension of KO or an alternate form of KO mainly due to the theme of both film which was based on media.
If KO showed how media can be used to do right for the people, Kavan shows how it can be used wrongly. The flow of the story is simple in its essence whereby it revolves around the hero who hails from a media and journalism background who has his moral and values and follows by it strongly. He works for a corporate news channels who does everything against his believes thus he leaves the organisation. Upon leaving, he finds a news channel which allows him to work on his ideologies and uses that to bring down the corporate news channel he previously work.
Although the story has no real magic to but the way KV Anand treated the film and Vijay Sethupathi performed made the film a value for its money. The story seems to have too many elements going on in which made the film a little draggy.
The love story between Vijay Sethupathi and Madonna, the rape of Kalpana, the chemical factory element, the connection between the politician and the corporate news channel and a few more to name the very least. KV Anand had try to pack in so many elements and dragged the film in a 2 1/2 hour film when it could have so easily trimmed into maybe a 1 3/4 hours or 2 hours film.
One scene which particularly didn't make sense to me was that at the end it was showed that Jagan and the rest took up the Zen One TV offer to "undercover agents" for Vijay Sethupathi and T.Rajendar yet in earlier scenes I don't get it why must KV Anand show that Vijay Sethupathi and T.Rajendar to be so heart broken and betrayed that these guys decided to move when it was their plan all the while. Could have easily cut off the whole scene or treated it so much differently with a one liner.
It the film there was one dialogue which Vijay Sethupathi will utter to the character Kalyan whereby he tells him that he should stop taking the audience to be dumb or something in those nature, but sadly KV Anand took his audience to be dumb in this film by showing how extreme the media can be used in a negative way which did not seem believable to me.
The whole sing/dance show seems so exaggerated and the whole climax scene which was staged by Zen One TV seems so overly done. Your hero told not to take the audience for granted but KV Anand you did take your audience for granted.
Despite a couple of loopholes here and there, Kavan has a story which is very much worthy a watch mainly for Vijay Sethupathi and Madonna's performance and the music
Rating: 3.0/5.0
Director Review
KV Anand
The one thing I love about KV Anand is that how well he blends in an underlying theme/message in a commercial film. In a time that 90% of commercial films are rubbish, KV Anand's commercial film are something that is surely worth a watch.In Kavan, he picked to show the negative side of media and has clearly done his research in that area and infused it to his film. I really enjoyed him referencing the US-Iraq invasion to journalism and media.
Being a top cinematographer in the industry before moving into directing, there is no doubt that this film's cinematography work was top notch. I truly enjoyed the climax fight scene and the way he shoot it in a slower speed yet kept the audience engaged with a quick beat bgm.
Throughout the film, the camera work was a real stand out point and credit goes to the cinematographer and KV Anand himself.
On the down side I felt he could have done so much better with his casting and the utilization of them. Pandiarajan and Nasser was tremendously under used while only god knows why he choose the guy who played Kalyan and T.Rajendar.Also I felt he could have tried to add more clarity in the dubbing of the scene when Vijay Sethupathi interviews the politician. There is a couple of shouting and noisy scenes where the dubbing wasn't so clear and it was a bit hard to understand what was being said
Despite a couple of attention to detail flawless, KV Anand has done some amazing work in the film which makes it a worthy watch.
Rating: 3.1/5.0
The Cast
Vijay Sethupathi
He plays a passionate media youth with so much energy and rawness. He is out of the best actors to emote out with his body language and voice. Absolutely loved the scene when he convinces Kalpana to speak about what happened to her in the hospital.
His area of improvement would be his command of the English language. He seemed to speak wrongly a couple of times in the film although it is not too noticeable. Considering the fact the character he plays here is a collage graduate and a strong potential, I feel he needed to be better in his English. Watch the movie trailer and you would be able to spot why I said so.
Rating: 3.7/5.0
Madonna Sebastian
This is the first time I am watching a Madonna Sebastian film and I am already a fan of her. I think she was tremendous in her role. She was so beautiful and elegant with so much maturity and clarity. Credit to KV Anand on designing a wonderful character and picking her.
Loved her rawness and attitude in the film. She seemed to perform the role with so much ease and grace. She is indeed a star in the making or maybe she is already a star. The scene which she performs with Vijay Sethupathi in the wash room was top class. If only she had a little more screen time and dialogues I think the character Malar would have a lasting impact in the audience.
Rating: 4.0/5.0
T.Rajendar & Akashdeep Saigal
Why would anyone even cast T.Rajendar is beyond my logical thinking. It was clear that by casting T.Rajendar, KV Anand has to infuse the horrible TR rhyming dialogues in to his film. Why KV sir why? I have so much of respect for your work but how did you even think of casting him into your film. Were you trying to play him off for a comic response from the audience?
It was so painful to hear all those TR dialogues over and over again and the quality of his acting was so low below par to the point even Jagan does a better job than him. A point which can be said in one line, now needs 10 lines of TR crap because he is saying it. KV sir you could have easily saved 10-15 minutes of screen time if you replaced TR with any other actor in the world.
Moving on to Akashdeep Saigal. I doubt many would even know this name. He is the guy who plays Kalyan. Yes he is the same guy who acted in Ayan and no, KV Anand doesn't seem to learn from his mistake in casting him in Ayan.
We live in a time where we have almost 0 quality villains so much so that someone like this is qualified to be a villain. If you told Raghuvaran that this is a commercial film villain, he might just wake up from his graveyard, just to get a heart attack and die again. From villains like Raghuvaran and Prakash Raj, we are now left to watch this kind of people being villain.
He makes a better Sunsilk model then a villain. The guy can't act for heaven sake and his body seems to go into shock and vibration every time he tried to deliver a dialogue. Please make this his last film, I can't bear to watch him anymore on screen.
Why would anyone even cast T.Rajendar is beyond my logical thinking. It was clear that by casting T.Rajendar, KV Anand has to infuse the horrible TR rhyming dialogues in to his film. Why KV sir why? I have so much of respect for your work but how did you even think of casting him into your film. Were you trying to play him off for a comic response from the audience?It was so painful to hear all those TR dialogues over and over again and the quality of his acting was so low below par to the point even Jagan does a better job than him. A point which can be said in one line, now needs 10 lines of TR crap because he is saying it. KV sir you could have easily saved 10-15 minutes of screen time if you replaced TR with any other actor in the world.
Moving on to Akashdeep Saigal. I doubt many would even know this name. He is the guy who plays Kalyan. Yes he is the same guy who acted in Ayan and no, KV Anand doesn't seem to learn from his mistake in casting him in Ayan.We live in a time where we have almost 0 quality villains so much so that someone like this is qualified to be a villain. If you told Raghuvaran that this is a commercial film villain, he might just wake up from his graveyard, just to get a heart attack and die again. From villains like Raghuvaran and Prakash Raj, we are now left to watch this kind of people being villain.
He makes a better Sunsilk model then a villain. The guy can't act for heaven sake and his body seems to go into shock and vibration every time he tried to deliver a dialogue. Please make this his last film, I can't bear to watch him anymore on screen.
Rating: 1.5/5.0
The Music
Hip Hop Tamizha
One of the biggest plus of the film is the songs and the sounds throughout the film. I loved the way he fused in a fast beat bgm for a slow motion climax fight scene. This guy has bags of talents and is without a doubt one of the budding talent in the industry.
Working with KV Anand is indeed a big break for him and he delivered with a very good album and I really hope he gets an opportunity to work with bigger directors and films.
The song "Theeratha Vilayatu Pillai" was the main highlight in the film where he blended in 3 different styles of music into one song and it was so catchy. Excellent work
Rating: 3.7/5.0
Final Verdict: Kavan is a downgrade alternative of KO
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