There is always a pressure on the director when it comes to remakes.
Many remakes have failed to recreate the magic of the original. It is
either because of lack of authenticity in dialogues as they are mostly
mere translations, the poor portrayals of lead roles, tweaking of script
and screenplay and above all there is always human tendency to draw
comparisons. When the talks for the tamizh remake of malayalam
blockbuster drishyam began, jeethu joseph had only two choices to
recreate george kutty played by mohanlal in the original - kamal haasan
and vikram. But, the obvious choice was kamal because of the connect he
had with the character - self learned genius.
There is a fair chance that an actor's performance in a
remake to be seen as an imitation. But, with kamal haasan onboard,
everything in papanasam is new and afresh except the script. He prefers
his acting to be seen. Unlike george kutty, suyambulingam is more
expressive and animated. But, this contrasting portrayal does not dilute
the script.
Though kamal haasan's mastery is felt throughout the movie,
the film entirely belongs to the filmmaker. Jeethu joseph has managed
to recreate the magic in tamizh. His screenplay goes hand in hand with
the editor's cuts. Editing becomes an integral factor as the film has to
travel back and forth at short intervals and it is lightning speed
here. The first half is little dragging as the plot takes time to build
up. Ghibran's "yeye en kotikaaraa" is already a chartbuster. In the
movie, it blends with the visuals to showcase the lush green beauty of
papanasam. His bg score is another factor which elevates the scenes -
the techno and jazz played where the police jeep enters suyambu's house
for the first time, the tempo when asha sharath visualizes kamal's plot
and unravels the knots in the movie. The scenes from other movies are
the same as in the original, but you hear whistles only when mohanlal
appears on screen with ilayaraja's sempoove poove from siraichaalai.
Gauthami's comeback movie has made her role memorable. She
overreacts at certain places which makes her role ranked lower than that
of meena's in the original. Nivedha Thomas, esther, delhi ganesh, ms
bhaskar, charlie, asha, ilavarasu play their role to perfection. Among
the supporting roles, kalabhavan mani stands out as the best performer.
He's at his menacing best. The dialogues of jeyamohan evoke humour
easily, the accent and dialect gel with the dialogues and each character
makes an impact with the dialogue delivery. Cinematography makes the
screenplay even more gripping. Each time the camera zooms in, there is
tension on screen. The suspense and tension built over the 2nd half is
the biggest success of the director. Each time a knot is untied and
suspense is revealed, there is applause in the theatre.
Kamal is not an atheist in the movie but his atheist side
pops out at two places - the sarcasm during the conversation with
theatre operator about swami varadhananda. Kamal says "avar muttrum
thurandhavar", theatre operator replies " atha poiyaa kudumbathoda
paatheeru?", kamal comes back with "neenga antha karupu chatta
kaararaa?", the second instance where kamal recites swamiji's speech to
his friends and he wears a black shirt while doing so. These are TM
kamal haasan.
Kamal haasan's suyambulingam bears a stark difference from
that of mohanlal's george kutty. Mohanlal had a calm and subtle yet
commanding look. Kamal, on the other hand is more expressive. This is
evident from the most gripping scene - a calf unearthed from suyambu's
house. Kamal haasan bears a cinematic heroism in his face, more of a
rajinikanth mode. That is the point i realized that, kamal has enacted
well but mohanlal made me believe. It did not end there. The climax
scene where suyambu confesses to asha and anand mahadevan is brilliantly
delivered by kamal haasan. The tears from his eyes are real and stirs
your soul. His fists tremble as he narrates a confession story.
Meanwhile, he justifies the title of the movie also. Kamal performs as
suyambulingam, mohanlal lives as george kutty.
However, this is definitely a comeback for kamal, as this
is what he is best at - the common man portrayal... Also, neither he has
a made-up face here unlike uttama villain and dasavatharam nor he has
larger than life image like viswaroopam.
Bottomline - you will like it if you have watched drishyam, you will love it if you haven't.
Bottomline of bottomline - Mohanlal might have been better
but the genius never fails to make an impact. One more masterclass
performance from Kamalhaasan.
