Jilla vs Veeram - Kerala Box Office Update

Jilla vs Veeram - Kerala Box Office Update

Veeram

 Sree Kaleeshwary initially signed for Veeram Kerala distribution rights @ 1.30 crore. But once Jillla was confirmed on the very same date, after much negotiations the rate came down to 78-80 lakhs. Including Print & Publicity of about 15 lakhs the total investment by the distributor is about 95 lakhs. Even though the film had better WOM the release time was bad [as per Kerala business was concerned], it got squeezed between Jilla and Drishyam and couldn't really get going. The film will be a losing venture for Sree Kaleeshwary with final distributor share coming in the range of 75 lakhs, costing them about 20 lakhs. After the release the 'in-ground' promotion was lukewarm from the distributor side too. The Kerala theatrical run is about to be terminated with film still playing only in a handful of theaters.

Jilla

Two of the biggest Crowwd pullers in the state uniting for the first time helped the film to take the biggest ever first day and opening weekend in the history of Kerala Box Office. But the WOM was mixed, plus the Drishyam phenomenon affected the films longer prospects too. The film when reports last came in had grossed between 8.5-9cr with distributor share of about 3.5 crore plus. 

The confusing fact about Jilla is regarding the distribution rights, the figures quoted is 3.5 crore [extra 15 lakhs for print & publicity], but there is no clarity regarding whether its a separate deal or instead (or a part) of Mohanlal's acting fees [Since its distributed Mohanlal's own Max Lab/Aashirvad]. If the former case is true, Jillla will also cost the distributor a few lakhs in the final tally. The film will be Vijay's 2nd biggest grosser in the state, falling well short of Thupppakki.The film is running in more theaters compared to Veeram, But will also terminate within a week or two.

So while 'Gross' wise Jilla is miles ahead of Veeram, but based on 'Returns on Investment' there's nothing much to separate both films.

Veeram - Movie Review

 

Veeram - Exclusive Movie Review

Directed by     Siva
Produced by     Bharathi Reddy
Written by     Bharathan (dialogues)
Story by     Bhoopati Raja
Music by     Devi Sri Prasad
Cinematography     Vetri
Editing by     Kasi Viswanathan
Studio     Vijaya Productions
Release dates   January 10, 2014
Running time     161 minutes
Country     India
Language     Tamil

   

Cast

    Ajith Kumar as Vinayagam
    Tamannaah as Kopperundevi
    Vidharth as Shanmugam
    Bala
    Munish as Siva
    Suhail Chandhok as Kumaran
    Nassar
    Pradeep Rawat
    Santhanam as Pichai Muniyandi
    Ramesh Khanna
    Avinash
    Appukutty
    Thambi Ramaiya
    Abhinaya
    Manochitra
    Vidyullekha Raman
    Suza Kumar
    Ilavarasu
    Mayilsamy
    Devadarshini
    R. N. R. Manohar
    Paruthiveeran Sujatha
    Amit Kumar Tiwari
    Kalairani

Ajith in a 'Vetti Chattai' doing a village based mass role after a long time was the main USP of Veeram and Siva delivered a perfect entertainer meeting the expectations.

Veeram is the story of Vinayagam, a one man army with heart of gold, darling of masses, his brothers and his love interest Goppurendevi (Gopu). The first half deals with the brothers with the help of Santhanam trying to make Gopu & Vinayagan fall in love, so that they themselves can introduce their love interests before their brother and marry them. While the second half story shifts to Gopu's house and native village where Vinayagan not only has to earn the love & respect of her family members but also deal with another enemy who is trying to eliminate Gopu's family

Story is nothing new or unique but its the Presence of Thala as the towering personality and Siva's smart packaging that makes it work. Its an out an out Ajith show, he oozes charisma even while simply standing. The screen presence he had in Veeram is impeccable which was sort of missing in his last 2 films.

Siva packaged an average script with perfection. The dialogues were very powerful and had punch, especially the one liners mouthed by Ajith. Camera, Editing jobs are well done. The locations are apt and beautiful and even @ 160+ mins it doesn't drag much. Santhanam's comedy in 1st half worked out very well.
The Interval action bloack in train was good, but nothing like it was hyped thanks to shoddy VFX. BG was terrific.

The biggest negative is the age old script and uneven script. The 1st & 2nd half are like 2 different movies. Tamannaah got a comparatively meatier role, but a holy mess of it, especially in emotional scenes. Her chemistry with Ajith didn't work out and their romantic duet songs were plain bad. Even though DSP scored in BG score the songs were average, so was its choreography. Action choreography apart from interval block was average. Santhanam's character got lost some where in the second half. The 4 brothers apart from Vidarth did average job only.The movie also lacks a powerful villain.

Siva using the image of Thala Ajith perfectly, mixing all the right ingredients in the perfect combination has given a good entertainer. Even though its no where near to being perfect, watch it for Thala, if for nothing else.

Rating: 3/5

The Mighty 'Head' Rules !!!

Veeram - Kerala Distribution Latest Updates

Sree Kaleeshwary who bought Kerala distribution rights for 'Veeram' has been in great dilemma for the past few months, reason their 'Veeram' clashing a film which is most probably going to get the biggest release Kerala has ever seen, Jilla.

 They bought the rights thinking that Jilla will be postponed to April. But after Jan 10 has been fixed as the release date for Jilla they are caught in a soup, because they also have Trivandrum area rights for Jilla. Now clashing with a film featuring 2 of the most popular stars of the state is a very bad idea for any other movie. So SK is now trying to resell Veeram as backing out was not an option for them. They have been looking for & making talks with interested buyers, but the price quoted by them will cost SK badly. Finally after much talks they have got better offers for Ernakulam & Malabar area  which they might end up selling soon . But they might hang on to Trivandrum area where they will have to distribute it along with Jilla.

If there are no other releases on same date and the X-mas releases hit Holdover Veeram could get 60-70+ theaters, and if there is 2+ days gap with Jilla the numbers could cross 100 as well, provided Verram hits the screen first.

Arrambam - Exclusive Movie Review

 Arrambam - Exclusive Movie Review

 Directed by     Vishnuvardhan
Produced by     A. Raghuram
Written by  Vishnuvardhan, Subha
Music, Re-Recording by     Yuvan Shankar Raja
Cinematography     Om Prakash
Editing by     A. Sreekar Prasad
Studio     Sri Satya Sai Movies
Release date(s)   31 October 2013
Country     India
Language     Tamil

CAST

    Ajith Kumar as Ashok
    Arya
    Nayantara
    Taapsee Pannu
    Rana Daggubati
    Mahesh Manjrekar
    Atul Kulkarni
    Suman Ranganathan as Ramya
    Kishore
    Akshara Gowda
    Krishna
    Prashant Nair
    Lee Whittaker

 Story

Arrambam tells the story of Siva, a commando officer, and his mission to find the ones who are responsible for an irrecoverable loss in his life and bring to justice those villains who are also a threat to the nation, with the help of few of his friends.

Arrambam was one of the most publicized Tamil movie since Enthiran. Even the title which was kept a secret till 2-3 months to release was done with much fan fare. An Ajith release after almost 15 months, Billa team reuniting for all these reasons the film had baggage of huge expectations. With a check mark against all the necessities before the release of a biggie, the film had humungous expectations surrounding it.

Now let's see if the film managed to live up to those.


Arrambam which was expected to be an out and out action thriller just fell short thanks to the half baked script. The first half of the movie is infact just average. Aarya-Taapse track should have very much been avoided. The movie never gets into pace till the pre interval portion, even though that sequence was executed tackily. Also Aarya surprisingly gets as many or even more screen space as Ajith in the first half, taking over the 'humor' part. The second half is much better, and in pace. Even though lots of things happens it has been conceived neatly. Logic goes for a toss in the movie, which is not a crime for mass entertainers.

Ajith is the mega plus of the movie. He never looked this dashing, stylish handsome and fit.
The character gets more scope in the second half & Ajith has done it with elan as always. Also credit to the actor for doing all those stunt sequences despite getting injured many times. Aarya too got an important role to play, especially in the first half its his character that help the narration move forward without much lag. Nayanthara just had to do the Billa act-nothing much [looked stunning eventhough], Taapse was OK. The supporting cast were very good.

Vishnu Vardhan is one such director who gives more importnce to the visuals than the script. Most of the times the narration suffers in the effort to make each scene rich [which infact is a plus of the movie]. In Arrambam to its more or less like that. Scripting by Subha should have more crispier, especially in the first half. But the dialogues were good with plenty of quirky and massy one-liners.

Special mention to the stylist - costumes, makeup man etc. All of the characters were looking their best, lead by Ajith.

Yuvan's music has been very good, the tittle/intro song and Tamizachi song were huge hits even before the release, now with the visuals expecting more to join the hit charts. His Background score was okay this time, nothing exceptional, but the genre had limited scope.

Camera work was top notch.Needed a bit more crisp editing as it drags here and there - a big no no for action entertainers.
.

The story has similarities with Sivaji and many other films that we have seen in the past, its the making and performances that saves the film. Thanks to the average first half , a great opportunity wasted (almost)

So in all Arrambam can be a great watch for 'Thala' fans, and above average time pass movie at the best for others.

Thala fan power and carpet bombing release coupled with immense hype should make the movie a hit.

Rating : 2.75/5

Verdict: Above Average

Box Office - Should be a Hit

Last Word: Go with less expectations

Mohanlal's Geethanjali postponed to accommodate Diwali releases ?

Geethanjali is one of the most awaited Malayalam movies of the year, because of the fact that it is a spinoff of 'Manichithratazhu', an all time classic. When the shooting began the idea was to release the movie during Pooja holidays [Oct 11th] and they were shooting with multiple units too. Then it was pushed to Nov 1st to get a solo, wide release.

But once the release date of Diwali movies were announced the film got again pushed ahead by two weeks. Geethanjali will now be releasing worldwide on November 14th. When Nov 1 was decided Only Krrish 3 was supposed to have a big release on that date, it was later that Tamil films - Ajith's Arrambam & Karthi's All in all Azhagu Raja joined the race. Both of these film were supposed to have arrived in different dates, but one got postponed and other preponed.

Other language movies [Hindi & Tamil] have a good market in Kerala cause majority of the people understand the language [If Telugu undubbed movies release with subtitles even those will have audience]. So theaters and distributors have made a lot of investments in these projects. So if a Mohanlal starrer gets released on that date it will eat into the screen count and opening week collections of other language movies. So it was idea suggested by Exhibitors federation too postpone the release as Geethanjali is also to benefit from the movie. Since 90% of the life time collections of most of the OL movies comes in the first week (or may be two weeks) it will be easy for Geethanjali to have a wide release on 14th.

So a win-win situation for both parties. But there was no other way possible for makers of Geethanjali than to postpone. Remember in 2011 when similar situation arose the exhibitors called for strike on some unnecessary reason to support Velayudham, 7am Arivu & Ra.One which were much bigger films than this year's OL Diwali releases.

Arrambam - Exclusive Preview/Story/Synopsis

It has been 15 months since the last Ajith film hit the screens. Ever since it was announced that film following 'Billa 2' will see a reunion of Billa team [Ajith, Vishnu Vardhan, Nayanthara, Yuvan, Sreekar Prasad] etc the hype has been paramount. Everything including the title of the film was kept under tight wraps. Now with just 2 weeks to go for the mega release majority have no idea about what the plot of the film, well according to sources got a basic idea of what the film is about. [What follows the image might end up as Spoiler, so continue at your own risk]

According to sources Ajith plays a commando in a security force like NSG & Rana Daggubati as his 'buddy pair' & close friend. The get called into action during the Mumbai 26/11 terror attacks where something unexpected happens. The event shooks Ajith's character so bad that he goes to unexpected lengths to solve some mysteries and find the culprits who are responsible for 'something' that happened that day.

The negative shade of Ajith that we saw in the trailer could very well represent this change.

Aarya plays the role of a computer hacker whom Ajith seeks help from in his mission [just like in sword fish/Die Hard 4] . Nayanthara is reportedly paired opposite Rana [unconfirmed] & Taapsee opposite Aarya. Talking more about the film might ruin the suspense, so lets leave it at that, plus sources can also go wrong at times.....

Unlike usual action films the film deals with a very important issue underneath, something that even the media ignored during the 26/11 attacks. So Arrambam is the mission of one man to find the truth and bring to justice the culprits.

The film has been censored yesterday with clean 'U' certificate by Chennai censor board. Censor board members reportedly appreciated the makers for their noble intentions and making an entertaining film out of it. The film will hit the screens on October 31st as Diwali release world wide.

Arrambam - Exclusive Music Review

 Arrambam - Music Review

Any Yuvan Shankar Raja musical is waited with bated breaths & if its for an Ajith film the hype even increases. Ajith-Yuvan combo have always given hits, Yuvan is also on a roll with super mega success of Biriyani, so lets see how this one turned out.

 Track List

  

 1. Adada Arambame

Feels like the Intro/opening song for Ajith. Its a festive mood song. It has got that zip and energy that should be associated with such songs. Shankar Mahadevan's voice should match like anything with Ajith. This is the song in the album that's gonna be an instant/first hit. With visuals the impact of the song is surely gonna grow

3.25/5

 2. Stylish Tamizhachi

 Song begins in super style with English rap portions that are simply rocking. It makes one feel that if we are listening an 'English' track for real. The energy gets transferred to the remaining portions of the song too. Its an out and out party blast track, this one is my favorite pick of the album, even though didn't like much after first listening. Singing, Instrumentation, lyrics, rap everything is Kick-Ass

3.5/5

3. Melala Vedikuthu 

A typical friendship song, might be picturised on Ajith-Arya-Nayanthara. This is the Holi song in the film.. Loved the lyrics of the song, 'messages infused' one. A particular portion in the music is also quite infectious. An above average song even after multiple listening, may be the video could change the opinion.

2.75/5

4. Hare Rama

Te song begins with high energy, but it soon fizzles out. The instrumentation is once again good but wish if the punch was carried throughout the song. The song has '50 Cent: Candy shop' inspirations here and there I think. Singing is energetic and apt for the song

2.75/5

5.  En Fuse Pochu

Looks like a fun romantic duet picturised on Aarya & Taapses. Has got funky lyrics too. Didn't like the song too much. Considering the theme of the movie a song like this could also end up as speed breaker. The only song in the album that i didn't like. But its not completely bad, liked in bits and pieces, but as a complete song its not up to the mark.

2.25/5

Arrambam in total is a Good, different album but definitely not an instant hit. It lacks that one 'blockbuster track' which can sell the entire album and even the film. Its a complete youth/urban album, maybe specifically orchestrated to cater the theme of the movie. It takes atleast 2-3 listening before you start to get a liking towards the songs. Its everyone's cup of tea and there is very little for the masses.

But for those who like a bit of difference and are fans of Western songs, this one should definitely work for you. I seriously think that once videos are out the songs are gonna be liked even more.

So all in all Yuvan fails to meet the humungous expectations that everyone had for the album. If you have no expectations you might like the album very much, for others I recommend you wait till the video promos are out or listen to song promos multiple times before buying it.

Rating: Above Average to Good

Rating: 2.9/5*

Last Word: Mixed BAG !!!

Buy/Download/Listen Songs Officially from following links

Nokia Music

iTunes

 Saavn

YouTube

* ([3.5+3.25+2.75+2.75+2.25]/5) = 2.9/5