Movie Review : Endhiran

So, I finally got to see Endhiran. In a half empty Bangalore multiplex on a Sunday morning, I realised that the Rajni magic is fading. When we look back at Rajni's career, there will be two phases - the growth to a pinnacle at Padayappa and the indifference and decline after.

Wait a minute, you say. What about the hits after - Chandramukhi, Sivaji even though they were balanced by Baba and Kuselan? All I say is two words - marketing hype. Sure the numbers are mind boggling, but then, the revenue streams are much more diverse and international now. Playing up the numbers is part of the machine. Rajni is too big now to fail. There is too much riding on him - and not just from a commercial perspective. He is our last Superstar, with a capital S. Can we let go? With him will end an era in Indian filmdom; one that has almost no real parallel in any other part of the world - a true star system, independent of the spin doctors.

Anyway, coming back to the much talked about Endhiran. Let me keep it simple - indifferent music, indifferent special effects (except for about fifteen minutes at the end, and most of it you've seen in the trailer) and most importantly, nothing Rajni about it, to coin a phrase. Since more people know the plot of Endhiran in India than can sing the national anthem correctly, let me not even talk about that. This should have been a Kamalahaasan movie. It would have done his ego good to duplicate himself about a hundred times, bereft of prosthetics and a need to act different parts.

For Rajni, it's a movie that is not about him. This is a director's movie and the show overwhelms the star. Me, I pay to see Rajni - the mannerisms, the dialogue, the emotion (please note that this movie is one where Rajni has no mother or family, which means no good son, brother thread to keep the hankies wet), the self deprecating humour and in-references (Endhiran has a bit of that). All I get here is a pastiche of I Robot, The Terminator, a Janet Jackson video, the Mask and Transformers. Rajni is incidental to the whole thing and for me, that's a no-no.

To be fair, the movie has a certain amount of philosophical sophistication in the script - debates on the nature of the creator-created relationship, Asimov's laws of robotics, the fusion of man and machine (Robo Sapiens!) and the nature of love. 

In the end, this is a movie about a robot Rajni on hormonal overdrive taking on the world to mate with a robotic-looking Aiswarya Rai. Given her acting range, that's only expected.