Under The Spotlight: Romeo Juliet

As the tittle says, Romeo Juliet is film centered around love, but its not your classic cult film which the lead characters goes against the world to prove their love and become one of the greatest love story of all time. No this is a love story with a modern touch to suit what the director's image of how Men and Women in the current generation perception of love and relationship. I repeat it's the director's view on things and doesn't represent the entire truth.

Story Review

The story is very simple in this film actually. Boy looks for his dream girl to fall in love and get married. He believes he will know who the one is when he meet's her for the very first time (yes love at first sight and he is ready to marry). Meanwhile girl's definition of love and marriage is that the guy has to be good looking and above all MUST BE RICH.

The heroine is air hostess and one day she bumps across the hero in her business class flight and sees him being requested to sit behind someone influential and famous on that flight. Believing he is rich and handsome, she tries to impress him with her looks but that din go to plan.

Later with the help of her friends, they track down the hero and stalks him to see he drives in an expensive car, uses a platinum credit card and drives into a wealthy house (which all doesn't belong to him). Seeing all this, she is convinced that he rich and decides to love him and win his attention

After a sequence of events they fall in love, but the heroine doesn't know that the hero is not rich and when she finds that out, she dumps him. He begs for a chance and she decides to teach him a lesson that money is everything by making him bring her out and spend lavishly. Eventually she dumps him

Fast forward a couple of months, the heroine gets engaged to a wealthy man and the hero starts to threaten her. He blackmails her into making her find a girl for him which will make him forget her. As that proceeds, he makes her do all the things he once did for her including spending lavishly. Eventually he meets someone and they hit things off

It is here where the heroine realizes that love isn't about money but care and ditches the wealthy man back for the hero who is about to be engaged to this other girl. In the process he teaches her a lesson via public humiliation before a twist in event where he ends up with her.

Morally, the film has a ridiculously stupid content which puts women very low and show how cheap men can behave. When you watch it, they will be alot of hate and frustration feeling. But put that moral value aside and judging the film by the film alone, its not a bad movie actually and it good to have romantic comedy films instead of the usual commercial masala. So in terms of that thumbs of the film

Although I feel at times the film was abit stuck between a romantic comedy and a melodrama but overall the film does well with alot of sequence that will make you laugh and is worthy of an one time entertainer.

Rating: 2.5/5.0

Director Review

Lakshman

It's a good attempt for someone making their directional debut. Would have preferred he shaped his characters slightly more maturely but nevertheless its a good effort. He picked on a subject which will get everyone interested to watch so that was a smart decision. But at times in the story and screenplay you could see some naiveness and rookieness in it. Huge credit for the director for making a film that gave alot of scope for the heroine to perform. It's becoming very much of a rare thing nowdays so it's encouraging to see films with scope for the heroine. I hope Director Lakshman continues to director more films in the future as I would be eager to see what he has next in mind providing he works on his weakness

Rating: 2.3/5.0 

The Cast

Jayam Ravi

Never much a fan of Jayam Ravi but I think now he is slowly finding where he belongs in the hierarchy of Tamil actors and looks like he has found what would be his best strength. I never rated him as a commercial hero or an action hero despite his good physique but he seems to ace it as romantic comedy hero or what is known as The Chocolate Boy.

So this film fits him perfectly like a "T". A helpless romantic who is also a gym instructor. Just the perfect role for the man and he delivers it very well. He seems so convincing as a naive guy and evokes his emotions well. Scenes which involves him being angry was a delight to watch where you will be convinced the guy was piss mad and you don't want to mess with him.

His only weak point in this film was his dancing but well not everyone is natural dancer and I don't see it much of a plus feature for a hero. He justifies his role well and showed why he was the right pick for the film. They can replace him with out hero's like Simbu or Vishal but I don't think they would do justice to the role like how Jayam Ravi did.

 Rating: 3.3/5.0

Hansika Motwani

Perhaps the actress that I despise the most along with Tamanah, so my review on her could be a little bias. Never rated her as an actress and I guess I never will rate her ever. She is just fair and cute but millions of miles behind being called a proper actress like Trisha or Nayanthara. Nevertheless that has nothing to do with her performance in this film

Felt she was ok for the role, someone who looks good physically and who is immature. She carried the character to be a little kiddy and not mature. Not sure if that was intended by the director or is it because that's the only way she knows how to act. Because her character is an orphan from young and she is who she is today because of her effort. Generally that will result in a strong mature character but here it's not

She had her struggles as usual in the scenes which needed her to cry. Never felt the crying was genuine at all. Given a choice I would pick Nayanthara as my lead for this film. I believe she was the director's choice too but had to opt out due to some reasons

 Rating: 2.9/5.0

Poonam Bajwa and VTV Ganesh

This were the other two characters who had any real weight on the film as well as the wealthy mappilai. Both of them did well and it was good to have Poonam back in films after a long time although its not really a role that would suit her. Yet she did well to woo the crowd with her performance and I was rooting Jayam Ravi to end with her instead of Hansika actually. VTV Ganesh had a minimal part to make his presence felt. Had only a couple of real scenes where he could evoke his humor and in those times he did well before his character gradually fades out and you wont feel it.

 Rating: 2.5/5.0

The Music

D.Imman

Loved the opening song of "Dandanaka nakka" but the choreography killed the "Kutuness" of the song and other than that "Thoovanam" was nice to hear. The rest are songs which perhaps I will never remember hearing again. Even the next time it was played, I won't know it's from this film. Rerecording was good and the background score was on point. Not mindblowing but a decent job to get us going with the film

 Rating: 2.7/5.0

Final Verdict: ROMEO JULIET is not the greatest love story of all time but a one men's perception of how today's generation see how love and relationships are

Final Rating: 2.7/5.0