Saravana

Rating: 2.5/5
Cast: Silambarasan, & Jyothika
Music: Srikanth Deva
Direction: K S Ravikumar
Remark: Poor remake of Ghilli

What starts off as an interesting story fails to retain the tempo and drags like a goods train towards end. Director K.S. Ravikumar has brought Silambarasan and Jyothika together (after Manmadhan) in Saravana, a remake of Telugu film Bhadra (Incidentally, Bhadra was again a re-hash of the Telugu Okkadu which was also remade as Ghilli in Tamil). Wonder why an experienced director like Ravi has not taken the pains to alter the screenplay and make the film a little different.

The story is about a college student Saravana (Silambarasan) who sees a girl (Jyothika) on a video recording, falls in love with her, and finds her to be his friend's sister. When they get to meet, he predictably tries hard to impress her, faces many difficulties, hurdles and setbacks. Strangely, he does not tell her about his love and devotion, so she does not know that he is carrying a torch for her. Jyothika's family members are involved in feuds and faction wars with other goons and dons. Saravana joins them and fights with them against the common enemy, thus earning their respect and gratitude. Her elder brother is played by Prakash Raj, who played the same role in the Telugu version also. He observes and approves of her match with Saravana, and when is dying (getting killed in a gang-war), he asks Saravana to marry her. However, Saravana gets engaged to another girl, further complicating the plot. He even plans to send Jyothika abroad again to save her from the enemy dons (similar to Ghilli). However, in the last scenes, he finally succeeds in getting hitched to his ladylove Jyothika after much action, romance, thrills, and spills with comic relief.

Director Ravikumar has said that remaking a good hit has advantages but hunfortunately he has not capitalized on this advantage. Music by Srikanth Deva is very ordinary. Comedy by Vivek is OK in some places but is a pain in the rest. Silambarasan is happy with this light, frothy, comedy-type role, with plenty of fights, like a masala film after serious roles in Manmadhan and Totti Jaya. Jyothika is very confident of another good show as in Manmadhan. Saravana, like Gilli has continuous excitement, thrills, action like a roller-coaster ride with the hero and heroine, like a train running downhill without brakes. If only, a little care was taken the movie could have repeated the same success. Alas, that may not happen now

- Gokul Santhanam & Prem Anand S
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